#3: Angela Bassett did the thing
I can hardly believe this moment happened less than a year ago but it was in 2023 that Ariana DeBose opened the BAFTA film awards night with a remarkable display of the unstoppable force of theatre kid razzle-dazzle hitting the immovable object of shoddy yet meticulous lyrics.
Others have provided the kind of line-by-line breakdown that some might find amusing that often leaves me cold, but what I loved about the song was that it married a Bush-era pre-financial crash celebrity naffness with a post-Hillary corporate attempt at intersectionality. DeBose, an up-and-coming star, hot from a principal role in Spielberg’s rendition of West Side Story is the sort of actress Vanity Fair would have featured in its baby blue and pink-heavy covers alongside a Michelle Williams or Alexis Bledel back in the day. This performance – breathy and yikes-y due to being both under-rehearsed yet over-rehearsed at the same time – is like the plucky niece of the 2008 charity single Just Stand Up! which saw Beyoncé, Natasha Bedingfield, Mary J Blige, Nicole Scherzinger, Miley Cyrus, Mariah Carey, Rihanna, Leona Lewis and more besides get up on stage in mismatching jeans and a nice top and make no attempt at harmonising their different vocal styles. You can, and I would suggest you must, watch the full performance here and remember what it was like to have to make and present a dance routine in a school PE class with a bunch of girls you weren’t really friends with in 25 minutes.
As for the offending line…the notion of Angela Bassett doing ‘the thing’ as conceived of by whoever wrote the BAFTA night script gave me the same body cringe/existential alarm bell as whenever a new press release comes out about a Michelle Obama vehicle. Please do not acknowledge me, you harmless, well-meaning people! comes the scream inside my head. I do not wish to talk about Americanah with you as you eye up whatever it is I’m doing with my hair during the conversation.
I hope Harris Dickinson gets charged with the 2024 round-up rap this year.
ncG1vNJzZmibop7Brq3SZ6qumqOprqS3jZympmegZIBurc2gnKWZXZeutL%2FEratmnJmZerW0xGaroaGenA%3D%3D