The Oscars seemed to know it had a moment to meet. It just didn’t seem to know which moment that was, where it was, or how to find it. The result was a telecast that seemed, as that sentence would suggest, completely lost.
It didn’t feel important. It didn’t feel special. It didn’t feel, despite host Conan O’Brien’s dogged efforts, particularly fun. There were highlights, of course, and some surprise wins. But shouldn’t Hollywood’s so-called biggest night feel…big? This year’s telecast didn’t just seem small; worse, it was forgettable.
It’s a shame, because things started out strong, suggesting a night that may even defy gravity—snarf, honk-honk—over low expectations.
I’ve already written a few hundred words—and would type more and more until my fingers fall off my hand—about how mesmerizing, profound, and, dare I say, thrilling the opening sequence was.
From the poignancy of the tribute to Los Angeles’ resiliency post-fires through its role in film to the soaring vocals of Wicked stars Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo, performing live together for the first time since the film premiered, the start to the show hit all the right notes. In the case of Erivo’s spectacular “Defying Gravity” final riff, so many right notes.
O’Brien was the court jester you’d expect him to be in his opening monologue, having an infectious amount of fun, the kind that makes one feel emboldened to take the air out of pretentious proceedings. He did just that, making him the first award-show host this season to directly address the controversy surrounding trans Emilia Pérez star Karla Sofîa Gascón’s Twitter scandal, roasting the award-season pariah to her face.
The opening hinted at a night that would mix high emotion with irreverence and maybe even some edge. But quickly after Kieran Culkin’s delightful Best Supporting Actor speech for A Real Pain, whatever engine that was powering the show quickly lost steam, and the train essentially stalled soon after leaving the station.
A major goal seemed to be to celebrate the importance and craft of filmmaking. This year’s show twisted the “Fab 5” format of having celebrities deliver heartfelt tributes to acting nominees by having actors instead pay homage to the nominees in the technical categories, like costume and cinematography.
It’s a lovely idea, and theoretically brought more personal connection to categories that most viewers tend to take a bathroom break during. But it doesn’t have the same power when the people being feted aren’t celebrities, and we know little about their work or their stories.
It doesn’t help that these tributes meant there was little time to actually showcase the work they were being celebrated for; confusingly, the costume presentation’s whole introductory bit, led by Wicked’s Bowen Yang, was how no one else in the segment was wearing their film’s costumes. Guess what the people at home would be dying to see during the presentation of Best Costume Design? The clothes!
A tribute to the James Bond movies—theoretically to honor longtime producers, who had just received honorary Oscars at the Governors Awards, but was awkwardly timed to Amazon’s recent takeover of the franchise—baffled more than it roused. That’s no fault of the performers: Margaret Qualley, Lisa from Blackpink, Doja Cat, and Raye, perhaps at least one of whom audience members may have heard of or recognized. It landed with a thud.
More invigorating was the tribute to Quincy Jones, which kicked off with an exuberant introduction by Whoopi Goldberg and Oprah Winfrey and was followed by a crackling performance of “Ease on Down the Road” by Queen Latifah. (The second song from its score performed during the show, it was a big night for The Wiz…) Yet the celebrity losers in the audience are too lame to enjoy a good time when it’s happening in front of them, and most of them refused to get up and dance along—low energy that translated to us watching at home. As always, thank goodness for Colman Domingo, Ariana Grande, and Cynthia Erivo.
There was a sheer lack of high-wattage star power at the show this year, with the Julia Robertses, Sandra Bullocks, George Clooneys, Angelina Jolies, and Brad Pitts of the industry all MIA. That did dim the light a little, which is not to say that the people who were there didn’t deserve the spotlight.
The pairing of Andrew Garfield and Goldie Hawn as presenters proved unexpectedly moving, as he thanked her for entertaining his late mother. June Squibb and Scarlett Johansson were a dynamic comedic duo. Amy Poehler and Ben Stiller, respectively, delivered great comedy, as always. But I can’t think of a bit that I’ll want to revisit during my all-too-frequent YouTube rabbit holes of memorable Oscar moments.
The show wasn’t that political, which is fine—except that everyone seemed to tiptoe around politics like a landmine that must not be jostled. They vaguely mentioned things like “the times we’re in,” which only brought more attention to the fact that few people said anything of meaning. It was over three hours into the telecast before O’Brien made his first dig at Donald Trump.
An award show need not be all about issues and politics, but this one so desperately seemed like it wanted to be important, never actually getting there. That is, save for one more appearance by the busiest people in Hollywood this award season: the Los Angeles firefighters, who were paraded out for applause at yet another award show.
It was the winners of Best Documentary Feature No Other Land, which was made by a collective of Palestinian and Israeli filmmakers, who made intentional, provocative, and inspiring political statements in their speech—only for their words to not be acknowledged for the rest of the night.
The other speeches, in general, were…fine.
I was touched by Zoe Saldaña’s bursting geyser of emotion when she won Best Supporting Actress for Emilia Pérez. I was grateful that when the film’s songwriters accepted their trophy for Best Original Song, they just started singing like lunatics, revealing to everyone who thought this film was important or artful in any way that it was actually made by a bunch of French cuckoos.
Adrien Brody won Best Actor for The Brutalist, delivering a speech that may have been construed as powerful had it not gone on for so, so long and instead earned designation as “exhausting.”
The Anora sweep became monotonous after a while, in a year when there was a real argument to spread the wealth among a great slate of nominated films. I was amused, however, that writer-director-editor-producer Sean Baker used one of his four wins to extol the virtues of going to the cinema and condemn the rise of streaming releases, only for Hulu’s historic, first-ever livestream of an Academy Awards to cut before the last two categories of the night, Best Actress and Best Picture. You couldn’t script that!
Mikey Madison, I’m sure you gave a charming speech. Unfortunately, because of Hulu, I wasn’t able to watch it. So I can only say that I feel bad for Demi Moore, who probably expected to win this (Boy, the Academy really can’t resist giving Best Actress to an ingenue, can they?), and Hulu, you’ll be hearing from me about a refund.
Listen, an Academy Awards telecast shouldn’t need a slap or a misread winner to be memorable. But it should, I don’t know…sparkle? This is showbiz! There should be razzle-dazzle. This is a show celebrating the world’s greatest visual storytellers, put on by the people who work in that field. It shouldn’t be too much to expect that very thing they’re handing out trophies for—moving hearts and minds through the power of filmmaking—to translate to the ceremony as well.
The night started with a battle cry from Cynthia Erivo, belting that Elphaba riff. But it ended with a sigh. That is, of course, if you were able to see the ending at all. (Hulu, you will pay!)
