Just Ken… to make us smile
On the bright side, the old man announcing the Best Picture winner managed to announce the right movie. On the other hand… what the hell was that?
If you watched, you know what I mean. At the end of the evening, 83-year-old Al Pacino shuffled out onto the stage to deliver to climactic top prize. He was chosen in honor of the 50th anniversary of the release of The Godfather Part II—shades of Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway being trotted out five years earlier for the same chore in honor of the half-century anniversary of Bonnie and Clyde. That time the envelope had the wrong movie title in it, and the hapless Beatty, who seemed to realize something was wrong, read it out anyway. Pacino had the right movie title in his envelope, but he just pulled it out and mentioned it off-handedly without bothering with a speech or a roll call of the ten nominated movies or anything. The announcement just sort of happened like an afterthought. Once a method actor…
But what harm? We all knew Oppenheimer was going to win, so it wasn’t as though any suspense had been squandered. And it was kind of a fitting end to an evening where the winners were mostly anticipated in advance (cf. my predictions) and, with a few exceptions, the hosting and entertainment were perfunctory. Nobody was going to jump up and hit anybody in the face this year. Jimmy Kimmel was back, and that’s the way the producers like it. The TV panel commenting from the UK called him “a safe pair of hands,” and that sums him up. He wasn’t going to rock the boat, cause any controversy or offend anybody, well, unless a Republican voter wandered into the auditorium at the wrong time.
Personally, I have always found Kimmel annoying, which isn’t necessarily a deal-killer for a comedian or a host, but he’s annoying without any compensatory benefit like, say, you get with Ricky Gervais. At this point, he’s mostly just telling dad jokes. You might laugh, but you don’t feel good about it. And his tone always seems to be that of someone who’d really rather be at home. Or maybe I’m just cranky and taking it out on him because of lack of sleep.
Actually, this year was an improvement in viewing the ceremony in a very major way. The telecast not only started earlier, but it was on the very day that the US switched to daylight savings time, so I was able to start watching at 11:00 p.m. instead of at 1:30 a.m. And it was over by the scheduled time of 2:30 GMT instead of 5:00 or 6:00 in the morning. That makes for an almost normal night’s sleep for me.
Of course, it didn’t actually start at 11:00 p.m. (4:00 p.m. in California) on the dot, did it? When it was announced there would be a five-minute delay starting due to street protests, I feared I wouldn’t get to bed early after all. To make it worse, Kimmel then came out and did a tribute to union workers and promised to drag things out so that the production people could get paid overtime. In the end it was an empty promise. Things actually wound up finishing up a bit early (something I don’t think has ever happened before), and Kimmel was actually trying (or pretending to try) to fill time. It didn’t help when final presenter Pacino rushed through his bit like a man who needed the toilet. But never mind, I was pleased.
Speaking of needing the toilet, my Oscars viewing experience was different in other ways this time around. After many years of being telecast in the UK/Ireland market by Sky’s satellite system (and before that on the BBC), this year the rights went to Britain’s ITV. Since the ITV1 channel isn’t part of the Sky package in Ireland, I had to tune in ITV1’s satellite frequency manually. That meant no use of those Sky features that I have become spoiled by. No pausing, no rewinding, no skipping commercial breaks. I had to just sit there and watch the whole thing from beginning to end as a captive audience in real time.
The good news at least is that doesn’t mean sitting through all the advertisements that take up much of the US broadcast. There was a long block of commercials in the middle of the broadcast all right, but the vast majority of the break time was spent with a panel sitting and watching the show from (I presume) London. They were led by well known presenter Jonathan Ross (speaking of a safe pair of hands), who used to do the same chore for BBC, and included actors Richard Armitage (Thorin Oakenshield in the Hobbit movies) and Fay Ripley (the UK version of Cold Feet), radio presenter Yinka Bokinni and comedian/film critic Ben Bailey Smith. When it was on Sky, I usually fast-forwarded through those bits, but I have to say this group was pleasant enough company, and they reminded me that the Irish aren’t the only ones who watch these things mostly to root for the home team.
So what about the ceremony over all? What is there to say? Not much. The acceptance speeches were mostly fine and sometimes not boring. Similarly, the presenters and their patter were mostly okay and sometimes not cringe-inducing. It is what it is, but I’ve gone over this ground too many times before.
The performances of the nominated songs are always a highlight, and I’m happy for Billie Eilish and her brother Finneas. Imagine winning two Oscars before you’re even 23 years old. Her song for Barbie (“What Was I Made For?”) is pretty enough, though I don’t know how many times I could listen to it before it would drive me cracked. On the other hand, I could listen to the movie’s other nominated song (“I’m Just Ken” by Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt) all day long, and Ryan Gosling’s performance—joined by Ronson and a bunch of guest performers and ultimately the whole auditorium audience—was a joy to behold.
It was the kind of exuberant entertainment that we watch these shows hoping to see, and despite the best efforts of the powers that be, that we sometimes still get to.
-S.L., 11 March 2024
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