This was a jittery Academy Awards season with the #oscarsowhite accusation of no nominations of people of color in the actor and actress categories. Tensions were high as the night began: how would Chris Rock handle his hosting duties, what would be boring and what would be exciting?
So, if we were in charge of the post-mortem of last night’s telecast, here are our picks for things that are a “go”, and a few projects that should be “red lighted”…
Green Light:
- Chris Rock did an unbelievable job. He may have even been a bit too hard on the Academy, but oh, well. His opening monologue was brilliant and his interview of theater-goers in Compton was hilarious, particularly the man who said the best movie of all time was “Superfly”. Edgy comedy is still our favorite, even if it doesn’t make the room happy.
- More edgy comedy: yes to Sarah Silverman, Louis CK and Sasha Baron Cohen; unpredictable is excellent.
- Girl Scout cookies: unlike Ellen’s pizza delivery in the past, Girl Scout cookies aren’t messy and support a worthwhile organization. Furthermore, we could see everybody from Morgan Freeman to Tina Fey munching on cookies (they were done with their Red Carpet walks, and by the way, Tina Fey looked awesome.)
- The moratorium continues on “Who are You Wearing?”. I’m sure every star’s publicist got that info out to whoever needed to know, but it was nice to see every woman being asked about her craft. But…I did want to hear about Cate Blanchett’s dress, as it was intriguing.
- Lady Gaga. Last year we said bring back Lady Gaga at every awards show, and she brought down the house with her powerful song about sexual violence, backed up by victims powerfully, silently standing by her.
- Last year we asked for a live song during the “In Memoriam” piece and our prayers were answered. Dave Grohl sang and played “Blackbird” beautifully while the images scrolled by. Much better.
Red Light:
- The scrolling caption of thank yous went by way too fast to read, and apparently, it wasn’t visible in the theater, so winners didn’t trust it, and they shouldn’t.
- Was Meryl Streep there? If not, why not? Never have an Academy Awards without her!