The Oscars are coming this Sunday, and further bile will be spent on it later in the week.
For now though, let’s concentrate on the awards ceremony itself. Everyone is more or less braced for a disaster; the Academy tried to hip things up last year to disastrous effect, then doubled down this year by hiring legendary Hollywood asshole Brett Ratner to produce the ceremony. Ratner’s acted like an asshole – who knew? — and they scrapped the idea… losing host Eddie Murphy in the bargain. Billy Crystal was promptly exhumed to save things – the first time in eight years he’s hosted the Oscars – which may have been their only remaining move.
Even so, it smacks of desperation. With the list of nominations as uninspiring as they’ve ever been and an institution now terrified of committing any further blunders, not even Crystal’s aging charms may be able to help them. In some ways, another bad ceremony may actually be a good thing: prompting the Academy to seriously rethink how they do this and perhaps bringing a real sense of entertainment back to the Oscar ceremony.
Who knows, it might even prompt them to start giving awards to deserving efforts instead of the bloodless crap its out-of-touch membership actually thinks is important.