The Oscars!

These were the most hyped Academy Awards in my 16 years watching. Surprises and dazzling showmanship were promised. Alright, Sid Ganis, show us what you've got...




















Hugh Jackman entered to a big-band jazz arrangement of the Lawrence of Arabia theme. It was surprisingly cool. The stage design was, as promised, more intimate. The band was onstage, and the decor evoked an old Hollywood ballroom. The stage wasn't very high, so the host was nearly at eye level with the nominees, and free to walk up to them for a kiss hello. He joked that Meryl Streep's 15 nominations must be attributable to steroids, and she flexed her muscles for him. Awesome.

Jackman, rather than a comedian, was chosen to host so that he could bring the song-and-dance pizazz he brought to his Tony Awards hosting duties. He started off with a Best Picture medley that at first seemed like a pale imitation of Billy Crystal's signature opening. But he soon made it his own, with a giggling, free-wheeling energy. The best part was when he pulled Anne Hathaway onstage for a cheeky duet in which his David Frost and her Richard Nixon pull in close and nearly kiss.















He also killed with a number featuring silver-clad dancers doing frenetic robot moves as Jackman sings "The Reader!" And just as you think to yourself that the telecast has reached a new low for incongruous, bad-taste musical numbers, he belts the next line of the song: "I haven't seen The Reader!" Take that, Harvey Weinstein!

The first award of the evening was Best Supporting Actress. First they showed clips of previous Supporting Actress winners' acceptance speeches. (Except the curtains didn't open for the first 10 seconds: Clips played behind a black curtain, and someone could be heard yelling "Steve, open them! Open them!") Then they replayed five of those clips over hanging panels, which were lifted to reveal former winners Eva Marie Saint ('54), Goldie Hawn ('69), Anjelica Huston ('85), Whoopi Goldberg ('90), and Tilda Swinton ('07). Then each woman gives a speech about each of the five supporting actress nominees. Oh, my god, are they going to do this for every acting category? This will take for-EVER! And yet, the one-on-one tributes are the best part; each nominee's eyes filled with tears during her presentation. (Though I groaned when Whoopi Goldberg said of Amy Adams, "It's not easy playing a nun!" Ah, yes, that Academy Award-winning classic.) The winner was Penelope Cruz: She gave a gracious speech, and like her boyfriend Javier Bardem did last year, ended by speaking in Spanish to her native country.















The Academy made a cryptic statement that the awards will be presented in a way that "tells a story." We learned what that meant when Hugh Jackman explained the categories will be presented in the order they occur in the production of a film, meaning the screenplay awards are first. Writer-actors Steve Martin and Tina Fey gave this presentation hilariously: "It has been said that to write is to live forever...the man who wrote that is now dead."
















The winners were Dustin Lance Black for Milk and Simon Beaufoy for Slumdog Millionaire. Black gave a poignant, emotional acceptance, thanking Harvey Milk for inspiring him in his own life and sending a message of hope to all the gay teenagers watching.

Jennifer Aniston and Jack Black gave the animation awards, and Black delivered one of the cruelest zingers, alluding to the bitter rivalry between animation studios: "Every year I do a Dreamworks film, take my paycheck to the Oscars, and bet it all on Pixar!" Then Pixar's Wall-E beat Dreamworks's Kung Fu Panda, and Black gave a "Yesssss!" (Also, while Black was joking about his own film, the cameras cut to Panda co-star Angelina Jolie. But the gossip mill thought it was a Jen/Angie thing. Eyeroll.)

Sarah Jessica Parker and Daniel Craig presented ALL THREE art department awards. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button took Art Direction and Makeup, and The Duchess took Costume Design. This was disappointing, because the costume winner was a man; the winners in this category are almost always women, and they almost always wear a fabulously weird dress.

Robert Pattinson and Amanda Seyfried presented a time-wasting montage about onscreen romances of 2008. Notable only because they included Sean Penn's passionate liplock with James Franco.

Ben Stiller has appeared on the Oscar stage in Starsky and Hutch garb and in a green-screen body suit. This time he wore a Crazy Joaquin Phoenix beard.

















He and Natalie Portman gave Best Cinematography to Anthony Dod Mantle for Slumdog Millionaire.

Jessica Biel gave the obligitory shout-out to the Sci-Tech Awards.

In lieu of a time-wasting montage about comedy films in 2008, Judd Apatow shot a short film in which James Franco and Seth Rogan put on their Pineapple Express costumes and watched the comedies of 2008 while stoned. (Those comedies included The Reader and Doubt.) Then they watched Milk and the Penn/Franco liplock played onscreen again, this time for the purpose of a lame gay panic joke between the Pineapple guys. It ended with them trying to make one of Janusz Kaminski's Oscars into a bong.

















The three stars of the film then appeared live, and told the audience that Janusz Kaminski is the first cinematographer to present on the telecast, to which Kaminski said, "Suck on that, Anthony Dod Mantle!" THAT'S what this show has always been missing: Cinematographer smack-talk! Franco mangled the name of the winning Live-Action Short, Spielzugland, and he and Rogan burst into stoner giggles.

Hold onto your hats! Next was the big musical number, a hodge-podge of songs from musicals (often just a single LINE of a song) from Hugh Jackman, featuring Beyonce Knowles (who tried to sing "Top Hat, White Tie, and Tails" like a sex kitten -- ick), and the stars of High School Musical and Mamma Mia!, presumably to court the tween demographic. The production number was designed by Baz Luhrmann, and it prominently featured music and film clips from Moulin Rouge.

Next came the Supporting Actor presentation, starring Joel Grey ('72), Christopher Walken ('78), Kevin Kline ('88), Cuba Gooding Jr. ('96), and Alan Arkin ('06). (Why didn't you show up, reigning winner Javier Bardem?) Arkin spoke praises for, and I quote, "Seymour Philip Hoffman", but it was Gooding who embarrassed himself by pretending to scold Robert Downey Jr. for stealing black roles when "the bruthas need the work!" Yikes. The most inspired choice of the entire broadcast was having Christopher Walken talk about Michael Shannon in Revolutionary Road. How much would you pay to see Shannon as his RR character do a scene with Walken?!?! The winner was Heath Ledger, and his parents and sister had the surreal task of accepting his award. They spoke kind words of thanks, and there wasn't a dry eye in the house, or at home watching. I sincerely hope the Ledgers were able to bypass the predatory press room following their acceptance.
















Another time-wasting montage interviewed the directors of the documentary nominees. It was briefly fun when one of the directors had an expletive bleeped, an offscreen voice said, "You just said, '[bleep]'," and the director froze.

Bill Maher came out and snarkily complained about having to follow the devastating Supporting Actor presentation. Then he complained his documentary Religiolous wasn't nominated, and made snarkier statements championing agnosticism. (Dude, I'M an agnostic, and you make me cringe!) Doc Feature went to Man on Wire, and the film's manic subject, Philippe Petit, stormed the stage to do a coin trick and balance the Oscar on his chin. Worthy of Jack Palance.
















Will Smith presented FOUR awards in a row: Visual Effects to The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Sound Editing to The Dark Knight, and Sound Mixing and Film Editing to Slumdog Millionaire.

Eddie Murphy held Jerry Lewis's Oscar close to his chest as he told the audience why Lewis was receiving the Herscholt Humanitarian Award. Then he gave the award "from one Nutty Professor to another", even though Lewis publicly blasted Murphy's remake.

Indian composer A.R. Rahman waited in the wings to perform the nominated songs from Slumdog as Alicia Keys and Zac Efron read the nominees for Best Score. They declared Rahman the winner for Slumdog Millionaire, so he came onstage, accepted the award, stashed it somewhere backstage, then came out again to sing "O Saya." Rahman went offstage while John Legend (subbing for Peter Gabriel) sang "Down to Earth", came back onstage to sing "Jai Ho", left the stage so Keys and Efron could present Best Song, and came right back onstage to accept the statuette for "Jai Ho" from Slumdog Millionaire. Rahman must have been exhausted.

Liam Neeson and Frieda Pinto presented Best Foreign Language Film, because they are foreign. It was neither of the two front-runners: Okuribito from Japan was the surprise winner, and the Japanese cast and crew took the stage. India wasn't the only country to crowd the podium!

Usually the "Death Reel" is accompanied by orchestra music, but this year it was lifted by Queen Latifah's tender rendition of "I'll Be Seeing You." Well done, producers. The prestigious last-clip-before-blackout spot went to Paul Newman, as it should have.

Reese Witherspoon gave Best Director to Danny Boyle for Slumdog Millionaire and he bounced like Tigger, just as he promised his kids he would.

Here come the Best Actress winners! Sophia Loren ('61), Shirley MacLaine ('83), Halle Berry ('01), Nicole Kidman ('02), and Marion Cotillard ('07) paid tribute to the nominees. Anne Hathaway looked like she would bawl her eyes out as the great Shirley Mac praised her acting and singing. The winner was...please, please, please...YES! KATE WINSLET!
















Kate hugged all five presenters and kept it together during her speech. She tried to find her Dad in the sea of attendees, asked him to whistle so she could find him, and Papa Winslet let out one helluva piercing whistle that brought down the house. Yay for Kate!

Finally, the Best Actor posse took the stage: Robert DeNiro ('80), Ben Kingsley ('82), Michael Douglas ('87), Anthony Hopkins ('91), and Adrien Brody ('02.) (Daniel Day-Lewis, like Javier Bardem, apparently blew off his reigning Best Actor duties.) My old crush Mr. Brody looked skeezy as hell with a greasy mullet and patchy beard, and DeNiro poked fun at Sean Penn's soapboxing and paparazzi fights. The winner was Sean Penn, and he himself admitted how difficult he is to like. He made a scolding plea for gay marriage rights (you're not helping!), but then gave a brotherly shout-out to the almost-winner, Mickey Rourke.















Steven Spielberg was ready to kill this thing and be done with it, but he was forced to drag out the Best Picture presentation with a montage of not just this year's nominees, but previous Best Picture nominees with similar themes! Are you kidding me?!?! The juxtapositions ranged from obvious (Frost/Nixon and All the President's Men), to groaningly crass (The Reader and The Graduate?!?! Really?) Slumdog Millionaire won its 8th of 10 nominations (and one loss, Best Song, was to itself), so the adorable children got to take the stage and grin their moony little faces off.

It was a loony show with tears, laughs, good music, and many spectacularly awful production choices. Everything an Oscar show should be.