Mark Ruffalo is torn over whether to attend the 2016 Academy Awards because he wants to represent child abuse victims featured in his movie SPOTLIGHT despite calls for an Oscars boycott.
The organizers of the Oscars have come under fire since the announcement of the nominations earlier this month revealed no black or minority stars had scored nods in the main acting categories for the second consecutive year.
Spike Lee, Jada Pinkett Smith and Snoop Dogg subsequently announced they would not be attending or watching the ceremony, and singer/rapper Tyrese Gibson called for comedian Chris Rock to step down as host. He also urged attendees to stay at home, telling America's Today show, "Don't keep showing up, acting as if you don't know what's going on, thinking about you. Think about the future generation. We cannot affect change if we don't stand up for something."
Ruffalo is nominated for Best Supporting Actor for Spotlight, which is based on a true story about a group of investigative journalists who uncover the sexual abuse inflicted upon children by Catholic priests in Boston, Massachusetts.
The Avengers star admits he feels torn over the Oscars boycott because he is a supporter of the Black Lives Matter movement, which campaigns against violence toward black citizens, but he also wants to represent the real-life victims depicted in his movie at the ceremony.
Ruffalo tells Sky News, "This is a conversation that we're having on every level in America today. The entertainment sector just happens to be one, we're talking about the criminal justice system, the education system, and when you're trying to make change happen and it's not happening then you kind of have to escalate the methods by which you do it. So I'm really sympathetic to what they're doing. I think the same folks who are getting involved with the Oscars should also get involved with the Black Lives Matter movement, I think it translates beautifully to that.
"(The boycott is) something that I'm struggling with personally to get behind or not. The only reason that I'm probably not going to take part in the boycott is because I'm representing another kind of victim, and the Oscars mean a lot to these people. There's thousands of people that have been voiceless, they have been sexually abused by priests, and I've given a lot of thought and although I've done quite a bit for the Black Lives Matter movement I feel like I need to stand for these people that I'm representing in this movie.
"But I do have a great deal of sympathy for it and I think it is a powerful gesture. And I think that those folks who are getting involved there should get involved with the people who are losing their lives every day in the Black Lives Matter movement."
Veteran actor Dustin Hoffman echoed Ruffalo's sentiment, telling the BBC, "Our county, there's a subliminal racism and it's been there... the end of the civil war didn't change that, it's only been 200 years. I mean this is just an example of it... Rather than black entertainers being nominated, there's a bigger problem with young black individuals being killed on our streets by police. That's a bigger problem."
The Academy Awards take place on February 28.
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