Millions of urbanites consider Angela Bassett to be acting royalty, and she just knew the 2023 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress belonged to her.
Bassett admits that her heart sank when another woman’s name rang out over the speakers. The mainstream press had a field day analyzing Bassett’s facial expressions and body posture and quickly determined that she was angry about losing the Oscar.
Turns out the media’s assessment was accurate. Despite garnering universal accolades for her performances from moviegoers and critics alike for her portrayal in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, the Oscar went to Jamie Lee Curtis for her role in the critically acclaimed dark film Everything Everywhere All At Once.
Her fans have ridden this emotional rollercoaster with Bassett before. Gen Xers and Gen Y’s vividly recall feeling pangs of disappointment over Bassett’s peerless performance as Tina Turner in the enthralling film What’s Love Got to Do With It? being passed over for the Best Actress Oscar 30 years ago.
The fact that it happened again in 2023 probably compounded her feelings of “supreme disappointment.”
“I thought I handled it well. And that was my intention, to handle it very well,” Bassett explained to Oprah Winfrey for the OWN network. “It was, of course, a supreme disappointment, and disappointment is human. I was disappointed, and I handled it like a human being. I was [gracious] for myself and my children who were there with me.”
Angela Bassett told Oprah she handled the loss like a champ
Bassett, who first rocketed to fame via her supporting role in the classic urban drama Boyz N the Hood in 1991, added, “There’s going to be these moments of disappointment that you’re going to experience, but how do you handle yourself in the midst of it? So we’re going to smile, we’re going to be gracious, we’re going to be kind, we’re going to party anyway.”
Fans are betting that the thespian who breathed life into her characters for such films such as Waiting to Exhale, Malcolm X, and 1995’s Panther (which starred her husband, Courtney B. Vance, and detailed the rise and fall of the revolutionary Black Panther Party in the 1960s) has more Oscar-worthy performances to unveil to moviegoers.
