LOS ANGELES: Actress Viola Davis says the increase in black nominees for Oscars this year is not a direct response to last years #OscarSoWhite backlash, as all the nominees "deserve to be there".
"There's a lot of typecasting -- age, sex, colour, dark-skinned, light-skinned," said Davis, who won the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role award at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday night.
"Response to #OscarSoWhite? No. I think that every nominee from Naomie Harris to Octavia Spencer to ‘Hidden Figures' to ‘Fences' to ‘Moonlight' to Mahershala Ali are up there because they deserve to be there."
"They're not there because of the colour of their skin. They put in the work. So the answer to that is no," she added.