If there’s one thing about the Academy Awards I can never predict, it’s the exact point at which I begin to worry whether I can possibly make it through the whole damn thing.
This moment tends to arrive in Hour 3, usually after the second of the two supporting acting awards has been given away to some Hollywood legend I thought I saw in the previous year’s In Memoriam reel and I realize that there’s no way I can win my office Oscar pool because I’ve duffed too many categories.
I may have also started thinking about all the important things I have to do in the morning, none of which will be at all impacted by the Academy’s decision to give Best Picture to one overblown, tediously self-important prestige picture rather than the other frontrunner, which probably stars Tom Hanks and has something to do with the Civil War.
To be honest, my work as a film critic means I see just about every nominee, even the shorts.
And yet despite my feelings of frustration and boredom over this epic-length display of self-congratulation by an industry that continually used lofty talk of art to disguise its essential core of rapaciousness and ruthlessness, I keep at it, glued to the screen like the millions of other people who repeat this same ritual every year.
Comments by stars like Leonardo DiCaprio and Anne Hathaway during past speeches have popularized the misapprehension that a billion people watch the Oscars worldwide. So what if the statistic has been repeatedly debunked? It’s more like 40 million in the U.S. and Canada, with the rest of the world being more interested in their nations’ own respective awards shows or, better yet, soccer tournaments.
Yet like the Academy, I still want to believe that the show is this unimaginably huge viewing event that somehow connects me with throngs of other movie fans, celebrity obsessives, would-be fashion critics and anyone else who still relishes the possibility of sharing a moment in time (actually, many, many moments) with innumerable strangers, all without ever having to forego the comforts provided by snacks or sofas.
The recent 50th anniversary of the Beatles’ first performance on The Ed Sullivan Show was a potent reminder that this kind of must-see TV doesn’t happen very often unless it’s a sports event on the scale of an Olympic hockey final. The audience is too fractionalized and factionalized these days – hell, we’re not even watching the TV’s few remaining ratings champs together at the same time thanks to PVRs and online and VOD options. Awards shows are a throwback to an earlier age of mass-cultural cathode-ray communions, with the Academy Awards retaining its place as the holiest night of them all.
None of which alleviates the agony I typically feel as I sit through a screechy pop diva’s misty-eyed performance of another wretched Best Song nominee somewhere in the middle of Hour 4. Luckily, as with any live event, there’s a chance that something unexpected will happen. These are the moments I crave and receive often enough to forget my gripes and misgivings and keep me coming back year after year. What are these tiny miracles of spontaneity, you ask? I tend to know them when I see them but they tend to fall into one of these categories…
The cringe-inducing failed jokes: As eager as celebs may often be to show the world they can have a laugh at their own expense, the Oscars audience can be a tough crowd. When a joke dies here, it can be ugly. Most hosts are wise enough to just move on and try something else, which is why David Letterman achieved something unique in 1995 when he refused to let go of a wrong-headed riff on the not-that-similar similarity of Uma Thurman and Oprah Winfrey’s first names. Instead, he drove the “Uma, Oprah” bit so deep into the dirt underneath the Dolby Theatre that archeologists will still be able to find traces of it in the year 2513.
The regrettable production number: Some of us will never get over the mental and emotional scars caused by the opening segment from the 1989 broadcast, a production number that featured the never-to-be-repeated combination of Snow White, Rob Lowe, backup performers in shiny star costumes and a closing fanfare of “Hooray for Hollywood.” As for me, I’ve started an online petition to force producers to restage it for this year’s show with Anne Hathaway playing Snow White and the eerily ageless Rob Lowe returning to the role of Rob Lowe. I’ll settle for another interpretative dance tribute to Crash or a sincere apology for Seth MacFarlane’s “We saw your boobs” segment last year.
The vaguely topical or controversial incidents: Nick Nolte and Ed Harris were among the luminaries who declined to join in the applause for Elia Kazan when the director – long a controversial figure because of his cooperation with the House of Un-American Activities in the ‘50s – was given an honorary award in 1999. Ever since, I have carefully scrutinized every camera shot to see if anyone else may be signaling something important – perhaps a distaste for Meryl Streep? – by not participating in one of the innumerable waves of applause that fill the show.
What with the resurgence of the molestation charges that were originally part of the very ugly saga of Woody Allen and Mia Farrow’s divorce, what can we expect to be elicited from the mentions of the Blue Jasmine director’s name this year? If some A-lister fails to applaud for Cate Blanchett when she inevitably collects her Best Actress Oscar, is that meant to signal disapproval for Allen or merely suggesting that Blanchett’s performance was a tad showy? Since I agree with the latter, I will stick with the sound of one hand clapping at home.
The WTF stuff that you never forget: Regular Oscar viewers have a special place in their hearts for these things. For some viewers, the show peaked with Native American actress Sacheen Littlefeather rejecting Marlon Brando’s Best Actor award for The Godfather. For others, it was that first glimpse of Bjork’s swan dress, which really wasn’t that bad all things considered.
I’m also keenly sympathetic toward anyone who’s clearly still recovering from the trauma of working with Lars von Trier. I for one will forever treasure the time that Bette Davis seemed to give an Oscar to Marisa Tomei by accident. As for this year’s possible eventualities, there’s a serious chance that Billy Crystal may fall from the ceiling of the Dolby Theatre during a badly botched Gravity parody sketch. Whatever happens, I’ll be watching. Even if I wish I wasn’t.
