The 94th annual Oscars were held on Sunday, March 27, 2022. This year’s Academy Awards promised to be a show where “Movie Lovers Unite,” which also happened to be the cheesy theme for the show. Although it’s hard to measure if they achieved this in the way they hoped, parts of this show will be remembered forever.
Let’s talk about the obvious. After Chris Rock delivered a hurtful joke about Jada Pinkett Smith’s hair, Will Smith jumped up on stage, slapped Rock and yelled, “Keep my wife’s name out of your f—ing mouth!” Mere minutes after the slap, Smith said art imitates life as he accepted his award for best actor in “King Richard” as Venus and Serena Williams’ father who was a “fierce defender of his family.”
I’m not here to fan the flames of the countless debates about the slap online, but what I can say is this moment will go down in Oscars history, for better or worse. Smith’s acceptance speech is an all-time memorable moment for me, in both the content and context, and it’s the most exciting moment from the show in years.
Highlights of the evening included the speeches from winners. Troy Kotsur and “CODA” made history with their wins. Kotsur is the first deaf man to win an Oscar — the second deaf person ever, behind his “CODA” co-star Marlee Matlin — and “CODA” was the first Sundance film to win best picture. Apple TV+ also made history as the first streaming service to nab a best picture win, beating out Netflix’s efforts with films like “The Irishman,” “Mank” and “The Power of the Dog.”
Raleigh native Ariana DeBose became the first queer woman of color acting winner, and Jane Campion became the third woman to win best director. Each delivered powerful speeches highlighting the importance of their win and made the night feel magical, even if their wins were somewhat predictable.
Some presenter bits were also really nice to see. The non-film affiliated presenters like Shaun White, Kelly Slater and Tony Hawk felt strange. But seeing people like last year’s Best Supporting Actress and Best Actor winners Youn Yuh-jung and Anthony Hopkins, the latter of whom was unable to attend the ceremony last year to accept his award, were wonderful moments. Youn took the opportunity to sign Kotsur’s name for his win and Hopkins was able to cool the temperature of the room post-slap, both well-appreciated.
Clips of all the acting nominees were also back this year, something I was delighted by. Although I’m proud to say I saw all the performances before they were nominated, clips give those who haven’t seen a performer yet a good idea of what their role or execution was like.
The Oscars have plenty of enjoyable moments, but it’s not a real Academy Awards until you feel embarrassed to call it Hollywood’s biggest night.
The decision to have three hosts didn’t feel strange at its inception, although the academy’s choices — Wanda Sykes, Regina Hall and Amy Schumer — did.
Each host had their own bits throughout the evening, including jokes about the handsomest men at the show from Hall, Schumer doing stand-up and Sykes at the Academy Museum. Although entertaining and not the worst part of the show, the hosts didn’t appear enough to make the whole thing pay off, probably due to the show running longer than planned.
In perhaps the most tasteless moment of all, the in memoriam segment was underscored by far-too-happy performances of “I Will Remember You” by Sarah McLachlan and “Spirit in the Sky” by Norman Greenbaum. This gave the segment a celebratory vibe, which I found really unwelcome and borderline uncomfortable.
Stopping on a couple names like Sidney Poitier, Betty White and Ivan Reitman to honor them individually was sweet, but still felt off alongside the rest of the segment.
One of the hot topics in the weeks before the broadcast was the decision to present eight awards before the ceremony and intercut them into the show to save time and make the show shorter. This was, in short, futile. This ended up being the longest Oscars since 2018, and in all of those shows between then and now, every category has been presented live.
In this broadcast, awards were presented in the Dolby Theatre in the hour before the show began, and speeches were recorded and edited into the live broadcast to appear live. The problem is anyone who wanted to know these categories before the ceremony was able to look them up before the show from anyone who was in the theater at that hour. Cutting them in felt very unnatural at home.
The producers also cut speeches short. Aneil Karia spoke first when he and Riz Ahmed spoke for their win for their short film “The Long Goodbye,” but was reportedly cut from the actual broadcast. The Oscars showed a real disdain for the craftspeople behind film without a flashy name, or even with, as best score was also announced before the show in which Hans Zimmer won his first Oscar.
The height of vitriol for film was truly shown during the Oscars Cheer Moment and Fan Favorite. These categories were overtaken by stans of all shapes and sizes, including Johnny Depp fans for “Minamata,” Marvel stans for “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” Camila Cabello zealots for “Cinderella” and the final boss of them all, Zack Snyder enthusiasts for “Army of the Dead” and a nod to the scene “The Flash Enters Speed Force,” whatever that means.
There was never any doubt the stans would take this category over, it was just a matter of how silly the competition got — and it got really silly. This was obviously an attempt to get more viewers, but that didn’t mean they were worthwhile viewers.
I can’t imagine a Depp devotee keeping the TV on after hearing the word “Minamata” or paying much attention before that. And moreover, these categories also took more away from the films actually nominated by the academy; these were 100% Twitter-generated winners.
More than ever, the Oscars felt cheap. Not in its production design, not in its winners, but the way they treat film lovers and filmmakers. I felt embarrassed to be excited for the Oscars when all the producers wanted to do was cower from their impressive film slate and pander to the masses instead.
But at the end of the day, unexpected moments are what make the Oscars. No staged bits, no gratifying the mob and definitely no cut categories make the Oscars worth talking about. The winners, their speeches, the nominees and everyone involved are the most important part of the evening. Let’s slap some sense into the Academy next year and make it about the people.
