Nothing about awards season for 2021 has been usual. Ceremonies have been pared back, red carpets have been largely virtual and star-studded audiences are a thing of the past.
But it’s not just the pandemic that has made this awards season different, the awards themselves are changing, too. In fact, they are breaking records.
Across the Golden Globes, Grammys and Sunday night's Bafta Awards, women are breaking records. From the most female directors to ever be nominated in categories across the major film awards, to women of colour taking home best director and actress gongs for the first time, 2021's unusual awards season has been a breath of fresh air for gender and racial diversity.
The Golden Globes kicked off the record-setting trend in February, when it named the nominees in its Best Director category, three out of five of whom were women – Regina King for One Night in Miami, Chloe Zhao for Nomadland and Emerald Fennell for Promising Young Woman.
Throughout its history, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association had only nominated five women for the Best Director award, and the category has never had more than one woman nominated in any one year. Barbra Streisand was the only woman to ever win, for Yentl in 1984.
That was until 2021, when Zhao reigned victorious for Nomadland, her recession-era portrait of itinerant people in the American West.
Zhao, alongside Fennell, also make up a record-breaking crop of female nominees in the Best Director category at the Oscars, which this year has more than one woman nominated for the first time in the event's history. Zhao's inclusion also makes her the first woman of colour to ever be nominated in that category.
Should she win, it will continue Nomadland's award season reign, in which she has already created history. Not only did the film sweep the Bafta Awards on Sunday night, taking home four out of a possible seven gongs – including Best Director – she took the top honours at Saturday night's 73rd annual Directors Guild of America Awards.
She is the first woman of colour to do so, and only the second woman to ever earn the honour. Kathryn Bigelow was the first for The Hurt Locker.
She is joined in a similar feat by actress Youn Yuh-Jung, 73, who has become the first South Korean actress to win at both the Baftas and the Screen Actors Guild Awards for her supporting role in Minari, standing her in good stead to make it a triple win with her nomination at the Oscars, set to take place later in April.
And it's not just in the world of film that women are smashing records in 2021. Both Beyonce and Taylor Swift smashed through industry glass ceilings at this year's Grammy Awards.
In February, Queen Bey showed the world exactly how she earned that title, taking home her 28th Grammy award, making her the most awarded woman in Grammys history.
"I am so honoured, I'm so excited," she said while accepting her record-breaking trophy for best R'n'B performance. Her daughter, Blue Ivy Carter, 9, made Grammys history herself, becoming the second-youngest person to ever win an award for her part in her mother's track Brown Skin Girl.
Swift set another female-led record, becoming the first woman to win Album of the Year three times with Folklore.
Almost all major awards ceremonies have faced diversity criticism in years gone by, and while those calls to progress are far from over, 2021’s season has shown people are finally starting to take notice, and with the biggest night of the calendar still to come, there could be more than a few records left to set yet.
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West Ham United 2 (Antonio 73', Ogbonna 90 5')
Tottenham Hotspur 3 (Son 36', Moura 42', Kane 49')
Another way to earn air miles
In addition to the Emirates and Etihad programmes, there is the Air Miles Middle East card, which offers members the ability to choose any airline, has no black-out dates and no restrictions on seat availability. Air Miles is linked up to HSBC credit cards and can also be earned through retail partners such as Spinneys, Sharaf DG and The Toy Store.
An Emirates Dubai-London round-trip ticket costs 180,000 miles on the Air Miles website. But customers earn these ‘miles’ at a much faster rate than airline miles. Adidas offers two air miles per Dh1 spent. Air Miles has partnerships with websites as well, so booking.com and agoda.com offer three miles per Dh1 spent.
“If you use your HSBC credit card when shopping at our partners, you are able to earn Air Miles twice which will mean you can get that flight reward faster and for less spend,” says Paul Lacey, the managing director for Europe, Middle East and India for Aimia, which owns and operates Air Miles Middle East.
Dubai works towards better air quality by 2021
Dubai is on a mission to record good air quality for 90 per cent of the year – up from 86 per cent annually today – by 2021.
The municipality plans to have seven mobile air-monitoring stations by 2020 to capture more accurate data in hourly and daily trends of pollution.
These will be on the Palm Jumeirah, Al Qusais, Muhaisnah, Rashidiyah, Al Wasl, Al Quoz and Dubai Investment Park.
“It will allow real-time responding for emergency cases,” said Khaldoon Al Daraji, first environment safety officer at the municipality.
“We’re in a good position except for the cases that are out of our hands, such as sandstorms.
“Sandstorms are our main concern because the UAE is just a receiver.
“The hotspots are Iran, Saudi Arabia and southern Iraq, but we’re working hard with the region to reduce the cycle of sandstorm generation.”
Mr Al Daraji said monitoring as it stood covered 47 per cent of Dubai.
There are 12 fixed stations in the emirate, but Dubai also receives information from monitors belonging to other entities.
“There are 25 stations in total,” Mr Al Daraji said.
“We added new technology and equipment used for the first time for the detection of heavy metals.
“A hundred parameters can be detected but we want to expand it to make sure that the data captured can allow a baseline study in some areas to ensure they are well positioned.”
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Expo details
Expo 2020 Dubai will be the first World Expo to be held in the Middle East, Africa and South Asia
The world fair will run for six months from October 20, 2020 to April 10, 2021.
It is expected to attract 25 million visits
Some 70 per cent visitors are projected to come from outside the UAE, the largest proportion of international visitors in the 167-year history of World Expos.
More than 30,000 volunteers are required for Expo 2020
The site covers a total of 4.38 sqkm, including a 2 sqkm gated area
It is located adjacent to Al Maktoum International Airport in Dubai South
Dubai Bling season three
Cast: Loujain Adada, Zeina Khoury, Farhana Bodi, Ebraheem Al Samadi, Mona Kattan, and couples Safa & Fahad Siddiqui and DJ Bliss & Danya Mohammed
Rating: 1/5
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
The President's Cake
Director: Hasan Hadi
Starring: Baneen Ahmad Nayyef, Waheed Thabet Khreibat, Sajad Mohamad Qasem
Rating: 4/5
Step by step
2070km to run
38 days
273,600 calories consumed
28kg of fruit
40kg of vegetables
45 pairs of running shoes
1 yoga matt
1 oxygen chamber
Mohammed bin Zayed Majlis
