When “Two Distant Strangers” won the Oscar for best live-action short at the 2021 Academy Awards, a pair of NBA stars were winners, too.
Kevin Durant and Mike Conley were among the executive producers for the film, joining the late Kobe Bryant as the only NBA players to cross over into winning one of the entertainment industry’s highest honours.
“Two Distant Strangers” follows a Black graphic artist, played by the rapper Joey Badass, who is stuck in a time loop that always ends in his killing by a white police officer.
The writer and director of “Two Distant Strangers,” Travon Free, has said previously Durant and Conley’s involvement went beyond being a source of funding and that they contributed to the film’s success and recognition.
Free, who became the first Black filmmaker to win the Oscar for live-action short film with the project, wore a suit jacket with the names of those killed by police when accepting the award.
“Today, the police will kill three people. And tomorrow, the police will kill three people. And the day after that, the police will kill three people because on average, the police in America everyday kill three people, which amounts to about a thousand people a year,” Free said. “Those people happen to disproportionately be Black people.”
