Eddie Murphy Called Out the Oscars Live on Stage in 1988 for Not Awarding Black Actors, Says Robin Williams Warned Him It Might Not Be Funny: ‘Why Go There?’

Eddie Murphy recently joined Entertainment Weekly to promote his Netflix documentary “Being Eddie” and looked back to when he presented best picture to Bernardo Bertolucci’s “The Last Emperor.” Murphy deliberately used his time at the Oscars podium to call out the Academy for failing to recognize Black actors over the years. He thought the bit would generate headlines in the Hollywood press, but Murphy says in the doc that he was surprised to discover there were barely any the next day.

“I remember being with Robin Williams backstage,” Murphy recalled to EW about that Oscars night. “I was like, ‘I’m gonna say this.’ And he goes to me, like, ‘But why go there?’ I was like, ‘Oh, you don’t think it’s funny?’ It was more, ‘Is it funny?’ Rather than, ‘It’s controversial.’ I was trying to be funny and say a little something, but be funny too.