The fact that the organizers of the “Golden Raspberry” are not primarily known for their political correctness lies in the nature of their award: since 1981, as a satirical counterpart to the Oscars, they have not honored the best but the worst actors of the past film year . The record holders are no strangers: in 2012, Adam Sandler was nominated ten times for Jack and Jill; A “Razzie”, as the prize is known colloquially in American language – raspberry means Raspberry – has been won several times in the past by Sylvester Stallone (four times), Kevin Costner (three times), Adam Sandler (three times) and Pauly Shore (twice). And thus, without exception, adult people who are very successful in their job and who should be able to deal with such criticism.
A first scandal in the recent history of the “Razzies” came in 2022, when an entire category was invented just for Bruce Willis – shortly before it was publicly announced that the legendary action actor had been diagnosed with aphasia, a nervous disorder.
This year, on the one hand, stars like Tom Hanks were nominated – but on the other hand a child: 12-year-old Ryan Kiera Armstrong starred alongside Zac Efron in the horror sci-fi film “Firestarter”. She was eleven when the film was made.
“Razzies” founder John Wilson has publicly apologized for the expected criticism of this nomination and stated that not only would Armstrong be removed immediately from the list, but also that their own rules would be changed so that no one under the age of 18 would be nominated in the future could. Wilson admitted that the criticism was valid and that you were insensitive yourself.
Read Wilson’s full statement in the original wording here:
“Sometimes you do things without thinking, then you are called out for it. Then you get it. It’s why the Razzies were created in the first place.
The recent valid criticism of the choice of 11 year old Armstrong as a nominee for one of our awards brought our attention to how insensitive we’ve been in this instance. As a result, we have removed Armstrong’s name from the Final Ballot that our members will cast next month. We also believe a public apology is owed to Ms. Armstrong, and wish to say we regret any hurt she experienced as a result of our choices.
Having learned from this lesson, we would also like to announce that, from this point forward, we are adopting a Voting Guideline precluding any performer or film-maker under 18 years of age from being considered for our awards.
We have never intended to bury anyone’s career. It is why our Redeemer Award was created. We all make mistakes, very much us included.
Since our motto is “Own Your Bad,” we realize that we ourselves must also live up to it.
Sincerely,
John Wilson, The Razzie Awards”
The “Golden Raspberry” will be awarded on March 11th in 2023 – traditionally one day before the Oscars. Here you will find the list of their nominees, including nine times the German film “Nothing New in the West”.