Regina King opened the show by picking up an Oscar in the COVID-friendly dinner area and carrying it down a long blue (!) carpet to the stage area where the nominees were all seated.
Her walk featured one of the innovations I enjoyed: King boldly strutted her stuff to pulse-pounding music that slapped so hard I checked my TV to make sure I had the right channel selected.
Since they were not in a theater, there were no union requirements to use an orchestra, so the Oscars had a DJ (!!!). Music Director Questlove is only the fifth black music director for the Oscars in 93 years. Some of his selections as DJ were quirky, but overall he was a welcome step into the 21st century.
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The set design was completely outside the box. Instead of broadcasting from the Dolby Theatre, where established stars, newcomers, has-beens, wannabes, and behind the scenes people sit shoulder to shoulder, David Rockwell created an elegant supper club vibe inside the concourse of Union Station in Los Angeles.
The atmosphere was reminiscent of the earliest years of Oscar presentations, with tiers of lamp-lit tables and high backed booths. It was beautiful and functional, with enough room for pods of people to be seated at a appropriate physical distance. Since the actual stage was relatively simple in comparison, the larger space was further featured by having some presenters stand out in the audience area among the tables for a more intimate feel while they read the names of nominees.
Movie set safety protocols were followed. Nominees were required to arrive in Los Angeles several days early, be in isolation from the general public, and get a rapid COVID-19 test on the day of the telecast itself. Some attendees wore masks throughout, but many were unmasked. That all by itself looked strange after the year we’ve had, but it was a pleasant change.
It was easy to tell the Academy made an extra effort to make people of color visible this year. Lots of PoC were presenters, lots of PoC won, including some of the top honors. Youn Yuh-jung is the first Korean ever to win the best supporting actress award, and Chloe Zhao is only the second woman to win best director of any nationality. Multiple references were made to the Chauvin trial, and Marlee Matlin introduced the best documentary awards by acknowledging that Darnella Frazier shot one of the most important pieces of documentary film in 2020.
However, the #OscarsSoWhite tradition won out in the end with respect to best picture, best actor and best actress. Unlike the Tony Awards, there is no requirement that Oscar voters must see all nominees in a category. Tony voters who do not see all nominees in a category are not allowed to vote in that category, but there is a strong likelihood that many of the traditionalists in the AMPAA never saw Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, One Night in Miami, The United States vs. Billie Holiday, or Judas and the Black Messiah. I have enormous respect for McDormand and Hopkins, and I’m sure they gave exceptionally fine performances. I plan to see both of their movies as soon as I am able. But we will never know if those other performances could have won if more Academy voters had seen them.
In one huge break from tradition, the order of the awards was changed, and best picture was not the final presentation. Rearranging the show to end with the best actor award was clearly done in the expectation that Chadwick Boseman would win. Boseman is the first Black man to be nominated posthumously for best actor, and many were hoping he would be recognized for his entire body of work, as sort of a Lifetime Achievement Award. Anthony Hopkins winning was both dramatic and anticlimactic at the same time, if such a thing is possible.
Sir Anthony was happy, I’m sure, to become the oldest best actor winner; however, he’s no fool and he knew something about the shock value of this upset. He was gracious enough to acknowledge Boseman in a brief acceptance speech taped after the show ended:
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Hopkins winning a second Oscar was a stunner but it was definitely NOT the most unexpected event last night. Folks are pretty much in agreement that the weirdest moment of the 2021 Oscars was Glenn Close twerking/doing Da Butt. I wasn’t surprised that she knew of the song, but when she was asked if she knew how to do the dance, well … either this was a scripted moment that should have raised a few eyebrows or she made a questionable judgment call and grabbed her chance to go viral.
The “Oscar nominees quiz” that prompted her dance was a fun idea though and they should do it every year. It went on a little too long, but it was an interesting diversion and should be a continuing feature. Name a great (or terrible) song (or movie or performance) and ask: did this win an Oscar, was it nominated for an Oscar, or neither one? I knew the answers to all three questions last night so maybe that’s why I liked the game. It doesn’t need to put people on the spot by asking them live, it should just be an on-screen game for future television audiences, as a lead-in to commercial breaks, for example.
There was some grumbling about the length of the silly quiz taking up time that could have been used to hear the best song nominees. They were all performed live but aired before the main broadcast began. I am of two minds about that, since I am one of the people they were thinking of when they made the change; I am inclined to switch the channel during that part of the show, unless I have a favorite song I am waiting for. But if the choice is between hearing all of them or none of them, I’d rather hear all of them. Especially since this year I did have a favorite:
The song didn’t win, and LO Jr didn’t win, but this is the best song nominee that touched me most deeply this year.
As for the fashions, I have to leave most of that commentary to others. Some of my picks may be on the worst dressed lists of the fashionistas, but I did have several favorite outfits. I loved the shimmering silvery-blue dress Regina King wore to open the show, and Viola Davis’s white “cutout” gown. The blue hooded cape and jumpsuit worn by H.E.R. was really spectacular, both covered and revealing at the same time. Travon Free’s tux with the memorial of names of Black people killed by police inside the jacket was a bold statement; it would have been just as nice without the yellow but I don’t blame him for making sure he got noticed. Halle Berry’s plunging strapless gown was an indescribably lovely color of rosy orange, and I may have been the only one who adored Emerald Fennell’s fluttery and flowy homage to the pastels of spring. Lots of women wore pants. I didn’t notice any men in dresses, but Colman Domingo was in a hot pink three-piece Versace TO DIE FOR. The only person wearing an outfit that I immediately wanted for myself was Youn Yuh-jung in an understated black on black patterned gown with short sleeves and POCKETS!
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