Is the Behind-the-Scenes Drama Hurting ‘The Color Purple’ During Movie Award Season?

This should be a glorious time for “The Color Purple’s” cast and crew. They should be taking a well-deserved victory lap through awards season. Instead, the film’s producer, Oprah Winfrey, has to address rumors of a feud between her and Taraji P. Henson and address the cast’s shocking on-set mistreatment by Warner Bros.

What’s getting lost in all this messy gossip is that “The Color Purple” is a triumphant story of sisterhood and female empowerment. We should be talking about the tour de force performances of Henson, Fantasia Barrino, Danielle Brooks and Colman Domingo. But nope Oprah has to waste time on the red carpet addressing wild rumors about a beef between her and Henson.

On Sunday, while walking the Golden Globes red carpet with Fantasia, Brooks and fellow producer Scott Sanders, the media mogul addressed the rumors with her good friend Gayle King.

“I heard that Taraji was upset, because you had been asked to do a rental car. I personally called Toby Emmerich, who was at the time the head of Warner Bros,” Winfrey said. “He said, ‘Well, that means we have to do cars for everybody.’ I said, ‘Then we do cars for everybody, and if it’s necessary, I will pay for the cars myself.’” Emmerich responded, “‘Well we don’t want you to do that.’ That was one thing, trailers were another thing, food was another thing. Everything got handled.”

Just to be clear, Taraji absolutely should be revealing the nonsense these professionals had to deal with during filming, because this was a big budget studio movie, not some small indie production. There’s no way Warner Bros. tried to make Robert Downey Jr. drive a rental car to the set of “Oppenheimer,” but somehow it was acceptable for a film centered on Black women.

Oprah said as much, telling Gayle, “I am a producer. Scott is a producer. We are not the

Studio.” It doesn’t help that there’s a segment of the population who really dislikes the former talk show host, so they’re lined up with their swords anytime she makes a mistake. To that end, some of these trolls want to see the movie fail, because they want to see Oprah fail.

This may all seem like behind the scenes production issues that shouldn’t make a difference, but unfortunately, it will for this movie. As we’ve previously explained, Black films are already starting at a disadvantage during awards season. Being mired in controversy gives voters an easy out to pass on “The Color Purple.” This is a shame because a beautiful musical about the power of faith, love and self belief among Black women should receive all the flowers.

If this all seems familiar, it’s because the 1985 version of the film went through its own controversies in the lead up to its Oscars run. It was memorably nominated for 11 Academy Awards, but won none. In the years since, some have blamed the NAACP’s boycott for the movie’s lack of awards recognition.

I’m not saying that “The Color Purple’s” awards chances are over, but all this negative press is certainly not helping. Warner Bros. could probably balance things out with a few positive stories, but it seems like the studio is more focused on campaigning for “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer.”