Comedian and actor Kevin Hart may return as this year’s Oscars host following stepping down from the appointment.
Last year Hart was announced as the host of the upcoming 91st Academy Awards but stepped down two days later after homophobic and insensitive tweets he posted some years ago resurfaced.
These tweets included comments such as ‘if I can prevent my son from being gay, I will’ and Hart joking about his son playing with a dollhouse being ‘gay’.
A month later the Oscars is still without a host and is running out of time to find one considering the ceremony is taking place at the end of February.
Hart may be happy to help though as in an hour-long interview on Ellen DeGeneres’s chat show the comedian revealed he is reconsidering his decision.
Following the controversy Hart was given an ultimatum by the Academy – either apologise for the tweets or step down from hosting duties.
Hart chose the latter claiming he had already apologised for the tweets before apologising again anyway.
Now though he is considering his options as Ellen, who has hosted the Academy Awards twice before, showed her support saying she has been in touch with the Academy itself which backs Hart.
Adding she suspects they hope he returns to the appointment, Ellen said during the interview:
I called the Academy today as I really want you to host the Oscars. I was so excited when I heard that they had asked you. I thought it was an amazing thing.
So I called them and said Kevin’s on, I have no idea if he wants to come back and host but what are your thoughts and they were like ‘oh my God, we want him to host, we feel like maybe he misunderstood or it was handled wrong, maybe we said the wrong thing but we want him to host’.
The Academy is saying what can we do to make this happen and I am saying to you as one of the smartest people I know, one of the funniest people I know… there are so many haters out there and whatever is going on with the internet, don’t pay attention to them, that’s a small group of people being very, very loud.
Agreeing with Ellen, Hart concurred the problem lies with those who unearthed his old tweets describing it as a ‘malicious attack’ on his character.
He then indicated he would be keen to return to hosting duties to take a stand against the trolls saying:
Leaving here, I promise you I’m evaluating this conversation. Let me assess, just sit in the space and really think, and you and I will talk before anything else.
If he does return it will be interesting to see what the online reaction will be.
The nominations for the upcoming Academy Awards will be announced on January 22 with the televised ceremony taking place on February 24.
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