Award Winning Ceremony: an Opportunity to Have a 'Voice'

“If opportunity doesn’t knock, build a door,” Milton Berle. Joaquin Phoenix is an American actor, environmentalist, social activist, and is widely known for hating the concept of award ceremonies. Over time, though, he built a door by turning his obligation of attending award ceremonies into opportunity platforms to speak for his social activism. He recently won an Oscar for Best Actor for his role in the film Joker in 2019 and used his acceptance speech to talk about the fight against injustice, but was his exegesis, or critical explanation, successful, considering the rhetorical situation and Kairos? Yes and no.

Kairos is “translated as ‘the right time’ from Ancient Greek” and “variously refers to an ‘opportune presentation’”. He is the God of opportunity which is different than an exegesis which means the critical explanation of something. Kairos is important because of the rhetorical situation. The rhetorical situation is “five basic underlying principles to a situation: The text, author, the audience, the purpose(s), which are the various reasons for authors and audiences to engage in communication, and the setting, which is the time, place, and environment that surrounds a particular communication”. Authors use kairos and the rhetorical situation in their writing, whether it is a speech or a love letter, to get their point across to the audience in a way they will understand.

Actors have been using award show ceremonies for political statements for years. They take advantage of kairos and use that opportunity to engage with their audience. One of the most famous Oscar speeches was in 1973 when Marlon Brando won the Best Actor Oscar for The Godfather. His speech was delivered by Sacheen Littlefeather, a Native American actress and Native American rights activist. His intention was to support the American Indian Movement (AIM) and to draw attention to the ongoing situation at Wounded Knee, the site of a previous Native American massacre in 1890, where Native Americans were currently under siege from government forces. As a protest against Hollywood and their despicable treatment of Native American identity in the film industry, Brando decided he “very regretfully” could not accept the award. This is a great example of using Kairos and the rhetorical situation to the fullest advantage because his speech was focused on one thing: Native American discrimination.

The most common criticism for actors who use the award winning platform for a personal or political speech is that it defeats the purpose of rhetorical situation or “it’s not the time or the place” and would prefer winners to just receive the award, say thank you, and get off the stage. People don’t watch The Academy Awards, better known as The Oscars, just to listen to celebrities give political speeches. People watch The Academy Awards to watch which celebrity won the Best Actor award or Best Motion Picture award. Though most award winners say thank you to their directors and crew, some celebrities, such as Joaquin Phoenix, have been building a door of opportunity to speak to the world about their concerns.

Joaquin Phoenix has been using his award wins as a chance to speak his mind about different distressing topics around the world, but has spread each concern with each ceremony. At the Golden Globes, Phoenix used his speech to talk about the wildfires in Australia and thank the Hollywood Foreign Press Association for their reference to climate change with a plant-based menu. Later that month, at the Screen Actors Guild Awards (SAG), he acknowledged his fellow nominees and the late Heath Ledger. At the British Academy Film Awards (BAFTAs), he delivered a speech about systemic racism and lack of diversity in the entertainment industry. At The Academy Awards, instead of speaking about one particular controversial issue, Phoenix tied them all together. “I think at times we feel or are made to feel that we champion different causes,” he said, when, “whether we’re talking about gender inequality or racism or queer rights or indigenous rights or animal rights, we’re talking about the fight against injustice”.

It is partially successful because he was put in front of a broad spectrum of society so, as a result, he reached out to a broad spectrum of society. He discusses the commonality between the different causes, which is the fight against injustice and how the passion of the people is fueled by injustice. This makes him inclusive to everyone. The main message of his speech is using “love and compassion as guiding principles” to solve the effects that all of society has on the world. He discussed being “disconnected from the natural world” because, as an environmentalist, he advocates for animal rights. When he singles out the dairy industry, the message of his speech loses effectiveness because not everyone is directly involved with agriculture. By focusing on the dairy industry, he loses the significance of Kairos to the rhetorical situation because it starts off being an inclusive message and then focuses on one issue: the animal rights movement. The problem is that it’s hard for people to connect to the animal rights movement because it doesn't affect society the way gender inequality and racism does. Gender inequality and racism involves everyone, which fits under his overall idea of an inclusive message.

Phoenix’s speech doesn’t use Kairos and the rhetorical situation to his fullest advantage the way that Brando’s speech did. Phoenix’s message wasn’t as focused. If he would have left out the information about the dairy industry, the speech would have been well driven.“Run to the rescue with love and compassion and peace will follow”. Phoenix ended his speech with a song lyric written by his brother when he was seventeen. This lyric is the main idea of his whole speech. In Brando’s speech, Littlefeather said “hopefully in the future, our hearts and understanding will meet with love and generosity”. Phoenix also mentions love and compassion a couple times in his speech when he says “when we use love and compassion as our guiding principles, we can create, develop, and implement systems of change that are beneficial to human beings and the environment”. Brando’s speech is directed towards using love as a solution to the discrimination against Native Americans and Phoenix’s was directed towards creating a peace between the human race and the environment, but both of them used to idea of love and compassion to solve critical problems happening to people in which Phoenix claims is “the best of humanity”.

Joaquin Phoenix is a social activist fighting against injustice. He said in his speech at the Oscar Awards that he loved the film industry and “the greatest gift it has given me...is the opportunity to use our voice for the voiceless”. He took the opportunity to speak about social activism. His exegesis was, for the most part, successful, considering the rhetorical situation and Kairos. His speech would have been better off without the discussion about the dairy industry, but he came back to an outstanding conclusion.  

As a whole, not everyone believes in animal rights or is directly involved with agriculture because everyone has a different background and culture. For example, some people are raised that animals are meant for nothing but sustenance while others are raised to treat every living creature as they would a person. Everyone is different and believes in different things. 

In conclusion, award winning platform isn't the right place for sharing personal statements regarding global and individual issues. It is a right place to have a speech connected with the award ceremony, career achievements and gratefulness.