Derek Chauvin verdict weighs heavily on Oscars broadcast

Following one of the most consequential court cases in recent US history, Hollywood wasted no time in reflecting on the state of race relations and police use of force in Sunday’s Academy Awards show.

The theme was revisited several more times, injecting politics into a broadcast seen around the world.

“I have to be honest, if things had gone differently this past week in Minneapolis, I might have traded in my heels for marching boots,” Regina King, the presenter who opened the show, said at the start of the broadcast.

She was referring to the conviction on Tuesday of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, found guilty by a jury of all three charges in the death of George Floyd: second-degree murder, third-degree murder and manslaughter.

The case has rocked the United States ever since cellphone video of the incident on May 25, 2020, went viral. The video showed Chauvin, a white veteran of the police force, pushing his knee into the neck of Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man in handcuffs, for more than nine minutes.

“As a mother of a black son, I know the fear that so many live with, and no amount of fame or fortune changes that,” said King, who directed One Night in Miami, a film set in 1964 and dealing with the civil rights issues of that time.