Ariana DeBose Gives First Interview After BAFTA Performance Memes

By Aaron Perine

Ariana DeBose addressed that viral BAFTA Awards performance and the ensuing memes. BBC Radio 1 caught up with the West Side Story star to talk about how that moment came together. In her comments, she revealed that BAFTA approached her to create a moment celebrating women. While the performance did accomplish that. There was also a ton of joking at her expense online. DeBose's short rap might not have been much more intolerable than a lot of awards show skits, but her particular pronunciation of "Angela Bassett did the thing" now lives in all of our heads rent-free. Check out what else she had to say down below!

"That's what I wanted to do. It's not like I was like, 'Hey BAFTA, let me in!' They actually called me, believe it or not," DeBose began. "That was the assignment, like, 'Come celebrate women.' I was like, 'Absolutely!'"

"We did that, and it was fun. Not gonna lie, I had a blast. So awesome, and then I spent the rest of the night cutting a rug with Emma Thompson. It was fabulous, I had a great time," she continued. "Baz Luhrmann came and found me and he was like, 'No, I think you're great, that was fun. I had fun.' And I was like, 'Work!'"

"That's a win, you guys," the actress said before taking into account the social media fervor she kicked up. "Apparently gay Twitter seemed to like it? So that's good, I'll take it. I told you, my people."

BAFTA Steps Up To Defend The Star's Performance

The producer for the show, Nick Bullen, spoke to Variety about DeBose's rap and the larger reaction to it. He called it, "incredibly unfair to be frank." Rarely, do you see a governing body step up for someone that had a social media moment like this in the immediate aftermath. It was just really nice to see so many stars show the star some love.

"I absolutely loved it," Bullen began. "Everybody I've spoken to who was in the room absolutely loved it. We wanted to open the show with some energy, some fun, and also lay out straight away that this was hopefully going to feel like a different night, but with a familiarity as well, and what Ariana did was exactly that."

"I think a lot of people don't like change, and there's a view that the BAFTAs have to be this slightly stiff, traditional British, middle-England messaging," he continued. "But American awards shows have much more razzmatazz, much more showbiz, and perhaps a broader range of people being involved. We felt we're not about revolution, we're about evolution."

"We don't want to just go for the traditional British award ceremony audience. The social media presence was incredibly important to us. The messaging to younger people was important to us. The messaging to the diverse groups around Britain was important to us," Bullen added. "We wanted to get the message out there that this is a show for everybody. And I think some people don't like that change, but you know what? You need to get with it because changes are coming."

Did you see her performance or any of the memes? Let us know down in the comments!

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