Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
The Schmooze

The Internet Is Demanding Maya Rudolph And Tiffany Haddish Host The 2019 Oscars

It’s unclear how many plebeians have to want something for it to become a reality but I think 5000 is a good place to start.

That’s how many people have signed a petition started by Care2, a social networking site. The author of the petition, who identifies herself as Rebecca G., points out that Tiffany Haddish and Maya Rudolph were funnier in their less than 10 minutes on stage than Jimmy Kimmel was in his two years of hosting.

The petition reads, “Jimmy Kimmel hosted the Oscars for the second time this year — and it’s the 23rd time a white dude has hosted in the last 30 years. In the last 20 years, just three women (Ellen DeGeneres, Whoopi Goldberg, and Anne Hathaway — as cohost with James Franco) and two people of color (Chris Rock and Whoopi Goldberg) have hosted the Oscars.”

Tiffany Haddish was the first black female standup in history to host SNL. Being the second black woman to host the Oscars? A piece of cake.

Maya Rudolph, of African-American and Ashkenazi Jewish descent, would only make a good thing better.

To be clear, Jimmy Kimmel is a true mensch. I love nothing more than to watch his emotional late-night monologues and I am as relieved as everybody else that his son has come out safely on the other side of his health scare. His short-lived relationship with Sarah Silverman will never be forgotten and, as far as white dudes on late night television are concerned, he is by far my favorite (and there are so many! That’s a real achievement!).

But it’s time to move over and make room for the women who are most famous for their urination/defecation scenes in female buddy comedies.

Becky Scott is the editor of The Schmooze. Follow her on Twitter, @arr_scott

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.