Razzie Awards retract 12-year-old Ryan Kiera Armstrong’s nomination for Firestarter—and for all minors going forward
Going forward, no one under the age of 18 will be nominated for the Razzies
Aux News Awards
The Razzie Awards are making some changes following the backlash surrounding 12-year-old Ryan Kiera Armstrong’s nomination for “Worst Actress” for her performance in Firestarter. First, the organizers of the film awards have retroactively removed Armstrong from the nominee list.
“Sometimes, you do things without thinking,” John Wilson, head of the Razzie Awards, says in a statement, per The Hollywood Reporter. “Then you are called out for it. Then you get it. It’s why the Razzies were created in the first place.”
Despite previously saying the “rage” surrounding Armstrong’s nomination was “overblown,” Wilson has since issued an apology to the actor and says from now on those under 18 will be exempt from the Razzie Award nominations.
Wilson says it “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 Ms. Armstrong, and wish to say we regret any hurt she experienced as a result of our choices.”
“We have never intended to bury anyone’s career,” Wilson concludes. “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.”
This is not the first time the Razzies have nominated a child actor. Famously, the voting body gave a nomination to Jake Lloyd for Star Wars: Episode I—The Phantom Menace in 1999, as well as Macaulay Culkin for Getting Even With Dad, The Pagemaster, and Richie Rich, all in 1995. Lloyd’s nomination is a particular sore spot, as he later quit acting due to his bullying from the press and public.
It’s a shame that sometimes adults need a reminder to not, you know, bully children, but here we are. This writer’s ethos when it comes to child actors is: if they put on a stellar performance, good for them! If they didn’t, well it’s okay, because they’re a child. Children simply do not have the same emotional processing skills as their adult counterparts and are less likely to be able to brush off something like a Razzie nomination (as seen with Halle Berry’s acceptance speech for Catwoman).
All in all, the Razzies are meant to be taken in good fun, but when a nomination feels like punching down, a need for sensitivity comes into play. The Razzies have come up against this before, retracting nominations for Bruce Willis and Shelley Duvall in light of the extenuating circumstances surrounding their performances.
66 Comments
Great first step. Now just cancel the Razzies.
Ideal way for it to end is them to nominate themselves. They win the final razzies and exit in a blast of self-consuming loathing.
Oh this is a nice thing to wake up to. I actually complained about this to my parents yesterday. Nice.
Your parents run the Razzies?
Ah, yes, Ian and Janet Razzie.
“ actually complained about this to my parents yesterday.”
Did they send you to bed without dessert?
What were you nominated for?
Didn’t you know? @cosmicghostrider is the Kinja account of 12 year old actress Ryan Kiera.
I thought he was Stallone.
That’s right…Frank Stallone.
Wrong Frank.
Wrong Frank.
You thought a 12 year old girl was Stallone?
Username checks out.
I bet they were really sad their child is such a loser.
hey fuck you
You are such a weird dude.
Certainly not The Lone Ranger
I hadn’t known that there WAS a new Firestarter…
I’d forgotten. It kinda came & went.
The brightest candle burns burns twice as fast, which doesn’t apply to any version of Firestarter.
I bet whoever paid for it isn’t being that cosmic about it.
I got a Razzle notification for this?
“We have never intended to bury anyone’s career,” might be overestimating the importance of the Razzies a bit.
“That’s why our Redeemer Award was created” suggests the audience has a level of familiarity with the ins and outs of Razzie-dom that I just don’t think is there.
I’m really starting to agree with whoever commented yesterday that the Razzies seem like one dude in his bedroom.
That’s 80% of the internet you’re talking about there.
80? Aren’t you the conservative?
No, as I said last time that was said, it was started by one guy in his living room. I should also add that he invited friends over.
All his rowdy friends came over?
If the Razzies ended Jake Lloyd’s career, I can only thank them.
My mom was friends with the guy who played the first victim in the original movie. So needless to say the franchise has a special place in my heart. /s
“Then you are called out for it. Then you get it. It’s why the Razzies were created in the first place.”That’s such bullshit. He’s out here thinking he’s doing a necessary public service when the whole idea of the Razzies is just meanness for the sake of meanness. Why do you care if someone “owns their bad” and why did you think it should be your job (literally!) to make sure they do?And I’d like to think we all know that bullying children is bad, but I don’t see why it’s okay to do it to adults either? I get that adults have more emotional resources to deal with it, but why should they have to deal with it at all?Also, is Zac Efron dabbing?
The Razzies just feel like a relic of another time that has no meaning in today’s world. The internet has levels of cattiness and “we love to hate” energy that they can’t keep up with, while also making it much more obvious how toxic those attitudes can be for real people. Obviously nominating a kid for a bad acting role was dumb, and it’s amazing it took the blowback for them to realize that. Wrapping up the hatefest in “speaking truth to power” just doesn’t wash.
Exactly. In 2023, I could, if I wanted, go to any star’s twitter or instagram and tell them *directly* that I think they were terrible in their role. I wouldn’t, because I’m a reasonably well-adjusted adult, but I could. And people do! All the time. Sure the millions of dollars probably makes it a little worth it, but I can imagine it really must wear after a while. And then being nominated for a Razzie on top of that must be like, fml. Maybe in 1981 when it started a person could get a chuckle out of it, but nowadays as you say it could really be the straw that breaks someone’s back.I looked at their website and it says they are a “counterbalance to the Oscars”—which, why? someone was just like oh this Oscar made someone feel good about themselves, we definitely must speak up so that this year they feel terrible, for balance you know—and brags that it has handed out “some humbling awards” to the world’s biggest stars, and why is that something to be proud of? It’s so creepy that they actually believe in what they’re doing. I’d almost feel better if they just owned up to just wanting to hurt feelings and be mean. Masking it as a public service makes it sound just so insidious. If you can convince people they’re doing something bad for the public good, you get a lot of bad stuff happening.
Have you heard about anyone actually being emotionally damaged by the Razzies?
Why would I have heard about it? Do you think I spend a lot of time talking to celebrities at all, let alone about their feelings? I’m not a Hollywood shrink.
If you think the Razzies are too mean that’s one thing, but without evidence I don’t buy the idea that the Razzies are emotionally damaging.
Bold of you to assume that I care at all what you will buy.
You cared enough to respond to my previous comment.
Your previous comment wasn’t about what you would buy, was it, dummy. You asked a question and I answered it, clearly a mistake taking you out of the grays. Your comment about what you would buy did not ask a question. It made a statement about which I did not care. I told you I did not care. I expected that to be the end of the conversation, and it turns out, it was. Bye now.
Funny, there used to be a commenter here who constantly accused me of “JAQing off” for asking questions he didn’t like, and yet here I am being criticized for not asking a question(like, I assume, “What makes you think the Razzies are emotionally damaging?”). Damned if you do…
Are you Jake Lloyd’s shrink or bartender, Iron Dinobody? Or Macauley Culkin’s? Even if they’re fine with it, which I doubt, err on the side of punching up for once, rather than punching down…again.
ALL of this. I cannot stand the Razzies. It’s a bunch of angry neckbeards living in Mom’s basement who want to stick it to the rich, beautiful people they’ll never meet. And this is far from the first time they’ve done this–even before Jake Lloyd and Macaulay Culkin, they nominated Aileen Quinn fro the Annie movie, in the first year or two of the Razzies. I don’t care if they nominate adults who know what they’re getting into. But shitting all over kids–in public, no less, even with the rescinded nom, the Firestarter girl’s life at school is going to be hell for awhile–is awful. And as you say, their smugness is enraging. You’re not speaking truth to power–you’re just being an asshole for the sake of attention. Well, you got it. I really, really wish the media would stop effectively promoting them. If they stopped getting sunlight, they’d wither.
What terrifies me is that they might actually believe the “community service” bullshit they’re shoveling, ElectricSheep.
Maybe the girl is screaming “DAAAAAAD!” and he misunderstood.
Sounds likely.
She’s screaming “DAAAAAAAD!” because no one dabs anymore. That shit was old and busted by the time Cam Newtwon was doing it on the way to losing the Super Bowl.
God you’re sooo brave.
Weird that you consider it brave to say…don’t be mean?
“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.”
In fairness, that’s a pretty good mea culpa.
I thought so too. But I’ve noticed that, all too often, whenever people say they are sorry, that’s when the mob detects weakness/blood in the water and goes in for the kill. Assholes like Trump and Boris Johnson have unfortunately proven time and again that you are more likely to hold on to your platform longer when you brazenly and shamelessly apologise for NOTHING!
I’ve noticed that in politics you rarely hear people give credit to someone for admitting their faults/mistakes. People usually go “See, he admits it!” and continue to act like the reason they never apologize for anything is they have nothing to apologize for.
Oh my god, he admit it
“We have never intended to bury anyone’s career,” Wilson concludes. “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.”Through gritted teeth, I will admit that this is a pretty damn solid apology.
“Our Redeemer Award” sounds like something you get at church for volunteering at a youth center or a soup kitchen.
Also, Jake Lloyd did a lot more than “quit acting” after the Episode I backlash. Multiple arrests, a schizophrenia diagnosis & stints in a psychiatric hospital.
Now when I look at that picture, I can only imagine the girl is screaming “RAAAZZZZZZIIIEEE!!!”
This writer’s ethos when it comes to child actors is: if they put on a stellar performance, good for them! If they didn’t, well it’s okay, because they’re a child. I would say that’s true for school plays or community theatre, but not sure that really holds up when talking about multi-million dollar professional films. It’s a separate question from whether nominating a child for a Razzie is appropriate or not (I think it’s a good move to stop doing so), but I absolutely think it’s fair and appropriate to critique a performance as part of film criticism.
I mean, it’s well enough to say that the acting in the early Harry Potter movies is not good. But there’s not a lot of reason to critique an 11-year-old because they don’t have much experience or range, especially when you can never tell if a child actor is eventually going to grow up and give one of the best farting corpse performances of all time.
When a child actor is bad in a movie they’re the least culpable person involved responsible for it, IMHO. Before them comes everybody who gave the go ahead for casting that child and especially the director for not being able to, well, direct a better performance out of them.
Good news, this was absurd anyway. Absurd to nominate a child in general, and, sure the movie was a forgettable turd, but the actress did not give a standout bad performance.
Good on them, but we could always ignore organizations that truck in negativity like this. As bad as podcasts and programmers that want to celebrate awful films, when all they’re doing is making a buck off of 1) insulting people whose projects failed and 2) people dumb enough to sit through awful films ironically. I should know, I did this for a long time and now it seems like a ton of wasted time and money.
It took them 30 years to stop doing this, from Brooke Shields to Jake Lloyd to today. I give them no credit for stopping now. It’s time people see the Razzies as the mean-spirited affair it is.
Like I totally get wanting to bring down self-important Hollywood egos down a few notches, especially with such a masturbatory, out of touch ceremony like the Academy Awards existing, but for whatever reason the Razzies always just made me actually feel bad for its nominees/winners (with the occasional exception). So, gg Razzies dude.
if they wanted to award the worse films of the year it’d probably have way more movies they didnt get wide theatrical release. Try harder rassies