He said that this whole online behavior is "incredibly unfair"...
Ariana DeBose's BAFTA Awards opening musical performance received extreme backlash online that forced her to deactivate her Twitter account. DeBose is known for her Theatre prowess and also bagged the Best Supporting Actress BAFTA award last year for her acting as Anita in West Side Story. She opened the night will all singing, all dancing performing many songs.
She even added a rap verse to praise all the nominees like Angela Bassett, Viola Davis, and Cate Blanchett. Nick Bullen had to come to the artist's defense after the backlash she got online. In an interview with Variety, Bullen said, "I think it's incredibly unfair, to be frank. I absolutely loved it. Everybody I've spoken to who was in the room absolutely loved it. She's a huge star, she was amazing."
"The songs she was singing are very familiar songs, the room was clapping, and people were sort of dancing to the music. That rap section in the middle, mentioning the women in the room, was because it's been a great year for women in film, and we wanted to celebrate that."
He continued, "And here is a woman of color who is at the absolute top of her game. And she’s opening the BAFTAs with a song that said so much on so many levels.
"All of those mentions, I felt, from the moment we were rehearsing it right through to the transmission last night, spoke to what we wanted to do."
Bullen's company actually won a two-year contract that will enable him to produce the awards, and he wanted to make it more American, "Our brief from BAFTA, and the BBC was they wanted the show to feel as though it had more energy, had more warmth, had a broader reach in terms of age range and diversity," he said.
He also said, "I think a lot of people don't like change, and there's a view that the BAFTAs have to be this slightly stiff, traditional British, middle-England messaging.
"But American awards shows have much more razzmatazz, much more showbiz, and perhaps a broader range of people being involved. We felt we were not about revolution, we were about evolution. Let's just evolve, let's just move forward with some gentle changes that start to lay out the stall of what this show should be and where we should be with it."
The 76th British Academy Awards was held last week and was hosted by Richard E Grant and Alison Hammond.
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