The team created over 40 wigs in six days which included a 30 foot braided wig that took three days and six stylists to finish. There were 22 submissions for Black Is King and they were shut out of every category of the 2021 Emmys, namely the award for outstanding Contemporary Hairstyling and fans have been expressing their outrage over the snub. Besides the catchy songs and the TikTok worthy dance challenges, you couldn’t help but notice the African-inspired intricate hairstyles from box braids and bantu knots to the 30 inch ponytail created by lead hairstylist Neal Farinah and his team of talented stylists. Farinah expressed the upset on his Instagram.
The 2021 Emmy nominees were announced on July 13, while there were some history making nominations and category sweeps that left the black and brown community reason to celebrate. There were a few projects that left us questioning their decisions, one being the reason why they ignored the hairstyling art in Black is King, a musical film directed, written and executive produced by Beyoncé. Twitter immediately expressed their outrage over the snub. Just to put this in perspective, the shows that were nominated for the hairstyling Emmy are the styling teams for shows like The Voice, Dancing with the Stars, Saturday Night Live, & RuPaul’s Drag Race. This isn’t to say that the hairstylists that worked on these shows are not Emmy worthy. The upset is that the academy failed to acknowledge the integrated work that went into creating the looks Black Is King.
The people were not happy about it here is some of what they had to say.
