A big controversy has erupted over the casting in the overrated Christopher Nolan film that is filling theaters: “The Odyssey.” The hullabaloo is over the casting of black actress Lupita Nyong’o as Helen of Troy. Could Helen of Troy really have been black? Who knows? Who really cares?

It’s Nolan’s film and he can cast whomever he wants. But we wonder if film producers are mandating diversity not because they want the best actor or actress to play the part, but because it’s how you win Oscars – which boosts revenues.

Since 2024, the Academy has ruled that no film can be nominated for the Best Picture Academy Award unless it meets diversity, equity and inclusion standards that include the number of underrepresented minorities as on-camera actors or in senior leadership positions with the film or studio.

Every studio nominating a film for an Oscar has to fill out a form setting out how it fulfilled diversity rules. The form is confidential. The Academy knows the demographic evidence each studio claims. No one else does.

No wonder Hollywood makes such lousy movies of late.

The fixed quota numbers in the Oscar rules could also run afoul of discrimination law. Earlier this year, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sent a Title VII compliance letter to every Fortune 500 company, telling them to stop discriminating on the basis of race or sex.

Kudos to Richard Dreyfuss – hardly a conservative- who has trashed the absurd  “diversity” mandates.