r/Oscars • u/Guilty-Bookkeeper512 • 36m ago
Angela Bassett actually did stand up for Jamie Lee Curtis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9P9MnHhacQ&t=150s
All of the reporting I saw at the time says she didn't stand. She didn't stand right away. But if you start at 2:30, you can see where Angela Bassett is seated, front row and almost dead center, right next to Austin Butler. At 2:35-2:36 in the wide shot, you can clearly see a gap in between the people in the front row, because she is still sitting and everyone else in that row is standing. At 2:37, the gap fills in, because she stands. It's not super clear video or easily visible when watching live (and you will need to watch it full screen in your computer), but she stood up. Then, if you pause it 2:36, turn playback speed all the way down, and freeze frame play it (hit the space bar twice quickly to get to the next frame and do that until you get to the right one) you will see that she is standing when they show the audience from the stage. The wideshot ends while the timestamp says 2:38, and the next frame, while it still says 2:38, you get a literally one frame short of her standing before the camera moves and Ariana DeBose is blocking the camera's view of Angela Bassett (they were concentrating filming Jamie Lee Curtis at this point after all, not the Angela Bassett). The timestamp is 2:38, but you have to freeze it on the exact right frame because Ariana DeBose is in between her and the camera. Keep watching, and at 2:47, she is still standing when the camera is showing the back of the audiences heads as they show JLC on stage. Obviously I'm not saying that if I saw Angela Bassett on the street I would recognize the back of her head. And her head isn't super visible. But since we already know that she is sitting, and that Austin Butler is next to her, we can tell she is standing because we can see the back of Austin Butler's head clearly and the lady next to him is standing. There was a man on the other side of him, so she was the only woman next to him. And his head is pretty clear to make out: he's 6 feet tall (and probably wearing slight lifts to make sure any photographers don't get a snap of him looking shorter than any woman he's pictured with), and he has a pretty distinctive haircut that is easily recognizable from the back. He's standing, and the woman next to him is standing otherwise her head wouldn't be partially visible since every row behind her is standing. At 2:51-2:53 there's another wide shot and again, you can't exactly pick her out, but once you know where she is sitting and what color dress she is wearing, even though you can't look at a still and easily say "that's Angela Bassett standing in the front row" you can clearly say "I see a purplish dress with hair that sort of looks the right shape that is wear Bassett was sitting looks like it's at a similar height as the rest of the front row".
In the one quick freeze frame where you can clearly see her, it looks like after she stands she still has her hands down and I see no evidence of her clapping. But she definitely did stand up. She made the face she made, she probably didn't clap, and she didn't stand right away, but it is not true that she refused to stand. I don't know how much that changes the discussion about her reaction/behavior, I just think it's obnoxious that the media made this huge story and didn't even report it accurately. I
