money Emma Corrin calls for Oscars to introduce gender-neutral awards
Emma Corrin has called for the Oscars to introduce gender neutral awards at future ceremonies.
The star of The Crown, who identifies as non-binary and uses the pronouns they/them, said that categories at current awards shows are not "inclusive enough at the moment".
Corrin has won a Golden Globe award for playing Princess Diana in series four of the hit Netflix drama, and is starring in two high-profile films this year, My Policeman and Lady Chatterley's Lover.
Speaking to the BBC about the possibility of gender neutral categories at major awards shows, she said: "I hope for a future in which that happens.
"I don't think the categories are inclusive enough at the moment. It's about everyone being able to feel acknowledged and represented."
'More of an urgency' needed
Corrin added that more representation was needed within roles in the entertainment industry to encourage "more of an urgency" around addressing the subject.
"When it comes to categories, do we need to make it specific as to whether you're being nominated for a female role or a male role?
"You can discuss awards and the representation there, but really the conversation needs to be about having more representation in the material itself, in the content that we are seeing for non-binary people, for queer people, for trans people, because then I think that will change a lot.
"When those parts come up, meaning more people and more actors are playing those roles, then I think there will be more of an urgency with which these questions will be addressed."
The organisations behind the Baftas and Oscars have indicated they are engaged in discussions about the subject of gender neutral categories.
Asked about the decision to identify as non-binary, Corrin said: "Your gender identity is so much to do with how you feel and it ties into so much of how you want to be seen or are seen by people and that can be very triggering or can make you uncomfortable if you don't feel you are being seen honestly or correctly.
"I think that it was necessary for me to be open and honest about it because otherwise I would have felt I was being perceived wrongly."
'I still want to play women'
Corrin believes "visibility and representation" is key to the "necessary and urgent" discussions around gender in society at the moment.
"I would never sacrifice integrity or honesty because of work that I may or may not get," Corrin said.
"My being non-binary is not a rejection of femininity or my femininity in any way. It's sort of an embrace of that.
"I still want to play women, my experience on this earth has been a female one - and now it's sort of a very fluid one."
Corrin's comments come as they prepare to take to the stage in an adaptation of Virginia Woolf's novel Orlando, which was published in 1928 and explores gender identity.
