Oscar Nominations: No Actor of Color as David Oyelowo Snubbed

In this image released by Paramount Pictures, David Oyelowo portrays Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in a scene from "Selma," a film based on the slain civil rights leader. (AP Photo/Paramount Pictures, Atsushi Nishijima)

Selma director Ava DuVerna and lead David Oyelowo are among the main snubs that leave the Whitest Oscars in 19 years.

Selma was nominated for Best Picture but the nominations left DuVerna and Oyelowo without a chance of winning Best Director or Best Actor.

All 20 acting nominees are white, for the first time since the Oscars honoring the films of 1995.

Also, all five directors and 14 screenwriters nominated this time around are men--for the first time since 1999.

Chadwick Boseman for Get On Up was another notable omission for the actors field, although some other omissions were white--including Ralph Fiennes for The Grand Budapest Hotel and Jake Gyllenhaal for Nightcrawler. Other movies featuring potential non-white nominees that didn’t get nominated--Belle, Rosewater, Dear White People, and Top Five.

The Daily Beast also noted the omission of female directors, screenwriters, and cinematographers.

“Gillian Flynn, who was at one point pegged to win for her Adapted Screenplay of Gone Girl, wasn’t even nominated. In fact, Gone Girl, which many predicted to be a major Oscars player, including in Best Picture, only managed one nomination for star Rosamund Pike,” it said.

“But perhaps that fact shouldn’t be a surprise, either, when you look at the eight nominees in that category: eight very masculine films with male leads and featuring nearly all-male casts. No female-driven films were major Oscar players this year—with the exception of Wild in the acting races—and only one Best Actress contender is in a Best Picture nominee.”