How Would You Rescue The Oscars Ceremony?

[PeterRS]

The Oscars will be on television this weekend - and few of my friends even know about it. No doubt the lack of new movies and the closure of movie theatres during the pandemic have much to do with it. But viewership of the Oscars ceremony in the USA has been in a steep decline for years. From 45 million in 2014 to a paltry 24 million last year. I don't know the worldwide figures, but China and Hong Kong have banned the telecast this year, due to the nomination of a short documentary on the Hong Kong protests in 2019.

Over the years I have watched various attempts to spice up the ceremony. None worked for me - apart from one brief moment when Ellen took a selfie with the pizza delivery man. So how would you change the format to make it more palatable for an increased viewing audience?

I'll start the ball rolling with a few.

1. Reduce the length. It is far too long.

2. Get rid of some of the categories. How many are really interested in the two documentary sections (no matter how good they may be)? Do we really need to see the Awards for Best Song and Best Music? Whilst we're at it, jettison the Short Film (Animated) and Short Film (Live Action). I would also be tempted to jettison the technical categories but I know that these tend to be the few that include extremely popular movies (unlike the Best Picture and Best Director categories) and so I would give them a reprieve.

3. Why the need for two often incredibly boring Presenters for each Award? We know they are reading equally boring lines from a screen. They have not even had the courtesy to the audience to learn them by heart. One Presenter with a brief that their short introductions must be pertinent, descriptive and witty would be infinitely preferable.

4. Why have a slew of separate sections to show excerpts from the nominated best movies? This can surely be shortened and done as the Presenter announces the movies in that category.

5. What is the point of Best Foreign Film any more? Foreign films often appear in the other categories - Foreign films have even won Best Picture. The Oscars should be open to more than just western-made/western-financed movies.

6. Too many awardees make speeches that could have been written by 6-year olds. Either that or "Oh, my gosh! I never expected this and I don't know what to say!" Nominees should be 'instructed' at the time of nomination that they must prepare an acceptance speech of not more than 45 seconds or so. This can not thank husbands, wives, mothers, fathers, dead ancestors and others who have nothing to do with the movie. Thanks to agents and managers are also banned. Who watching worldwide will have any clue who they are? Thanks to a movie's producers and crew must be limited to a fixed number - say, six. Finally, their acceptance speech should either be witty, promote social change or both - and that's it!

7. The entertainment between the presentations is frequently just plain dull. it is surely not outwith the imagination of producers to take a tip or two from Broadway where stage ensemble numbers are often spell-binding. Even if there are no musical-type movies one year, there is absolutely nothing to prevent the producers going back in time to create exciting numbers from movies of earlier years.  

8. And then the crux - the awful show hosts. Yes, I know that is an exaggeration but so many have verged on the awful. When you have a Presenter or Presenters for each category, why do you also need a host? Just to give a boring monologue with a host of usually lame 'in' jokes? 

The Oscar show has become the antithesis of the 'Magic of the Movies'. Movies ARE magic. Whatever format the Academy eventually adopts, it absolutely must get the magic back into the ceremony - or become totally insignificant.

[nycman]

I’d improve it, by getting rid of it.

A bunch of egomaniacs patting each other on the back. 

The world has so many more important thing to attend to. 

[PeterRS]

10 hours ago, nycman said:

I’d improve it, by getting rid of it.

A bunch of egomaniacs patting each other on the back. 

The world has so many more important thing to attend to. 

People can argue - successfully - that the world has much more important things to attend to than hundreds of millions visiting a cinema act year. But they do. Masses could do more important things than watching mlndless television shows round the world. But they do. It is, like it or not, a part of 21st century living.

I see no problem with an Academy Awards Ceremony as such. You could say - again successfully - that movies bring a touch of joy, magic, glitz, glamour, call it what you will, to the lives of vast numbers. And if the Academy Awards are to continue, they really have to mirror that sense of joy and magic. From the little I watched this morning, the show has descended to new lows of sheer boredom. Unless the Academy can get its act together, I would also get rid of it.

[Lonnie]

6 hours ago, PeterRS said:

Academy can get its act together

Maybe in the future but this was a POS...I feel asleep.

[TotallyOz]

I still enjoy it. But, this year, I didn't get as into it as I didn't like the movies or didn't get to see them all. On a normal year, I love it!

[PeterRS]

I thought moving the Best Actress and Best Actor above Best Picture was crazy. Besides, I don't recall seeing Joaquin Phoenix accepting Anthony Hopkins Award. Was I asleep at that point? I heard that Olivia Coleman was supposed to accept the award but that for some reason (technical?) she could not appear. Hopkins himself has been in isolation in Wales for some time and so his absence must have been expected. I thought the whole thing was a near disaster.

[Pete1111]

Chloe Zhou's acceptance for Best Director was so moving.  It was the highlight for me.  There were some awful acceptance speeches too. 

Considering what the pandemic has wrought, the show did OK.  I liked their use of Union Station as the venue. 

I was excited to hear about the new Academy Museum opening this year.

[PeterRS]

On 4/26/2021 at 11:37 PM, Pete1111 said:

Chloe Zhou's acceptance for Best Director was so moving.  It was the highlight for me ....   I liked their use of Union Station as the venue. 

Agree on both counts. But overall I agree with the comment in a newspaper I normally do not read. Britain's Daily Telegraph described the show as "a broadcast that was at once bombastic and underwhelming, and which swung between unbearable grandiosity and giggling amateurishness."

[Pete1111]

The Academy is putting on a brave face right now and did the best they could.

I agree, shortening the program would help. 

Some of the acceptance speeches were pretty bad, but that is difficult to control.

[caeron]

 

The year Crash won was the last time I watched. The whole thing is a little too self-congratulatory to me. Hollywood loves Hollywood, and they are happy to tell you all about it.

[Pete1111]

On 4/28/2021 at 8:44 AM, caeron said:

 

The year Crash won was the last time I watched. The whole thing is a little too self-congratulatory to me. Hollywood loves Hollywood, and they are happy to tell you all about it.

There were members that refused to watch Brokeback Mountain.  In recent times the members seem much more flexible on diversity.

The year that the wrong winner was announced (Moonlight won) was very telling, that those running the show may have lost focus on the little details that are so important. 

 

[PeterRS]

Steven Soderbergh, who produced this year's Oscar TV show, has confirmed to the Los Angeles Times that the order of Best Actress, Best Actor and  Best Picture was changed for two reasons. The anticipation that Chadwick Boseman would posthumously win Best Actor and that his widow's speech would make a perfect emotional ending. Second, speeches in previous years by Best Male and Female Actors were generally far more interesting that those of the producers of the Best Picture.

Anthony Hopkins was in Wales and prepared to be present on video link despite its being around 4 am, but Soderbergh would not allow video links. Then Hopkins asked Olivia Coleman to accept the award in the London bubble should he win. That was also nixed by Soderbergh. Hence the totally dud ending like a fireworks show where none of the fireworks worked. I would have liked to hear Hopkins as he would have been vastly more interesting than the no acceptance speech given by Joaquin Phoenix and no winding up by the no host policy.

It can be no surprise to Academy members that viewing figures in the USA were 58% down on last year. RIP Oscars. The Grim Reaper is on the horizon.

https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/movies/story/2021-05-04/steven-soderbergh-oscars-ending-chadwick-boseman-anthony-hopkins