Oscar Right And Wrong

RIGHT

The simulcast. The Grammys and music will never get the respect they deserve until they respect themselves. When you're beholden to Les Moonves, you're beholden to someone who only cares about ratings and his paycheck. When will Neil Portnow grow a pair of balls and stand up to CBS?

That's right, never.

WRONG

Ellen DeGeneres.

If you're trying to move forward, you don't play it safe. Then again, safe is what the movie industry has become. If it can't play around the world, if it can't have sequels, they're not interested.

RIGHT

Nominating the best pictures, irrelevant of box office success. Once you kowtow to the minions you sacrifice your mission.

WRONG

Ten nominees for Best Picture, or is it nine? I don't know, but by trying to create a big tent and include everybody the Academy has diluted the water and made it hard for all of us to wrap our head around the awards. We live in an era of cacophony. We want people to whittle evidence down. If you're giving me too much choice, I walk on by. Just talk to a salesman... Everybody who's ever plied the floor knows you only show two items, after that...the customer becomes confused and leaves empty-handed.

RIGHT

Small theatre.

The Kodak, er, Dolby, grants intimacy and gravitas. We live in a world of walls. If I can't get in, I'm intrigued. Moving the Grammys to an arena just means more irrelevant people in monkey suits can get inside.

WRONG

Making us sit through so much we don't want to see. Credit the Grammys with realizing most people don't want to see classical and other "niche" genres and giving us all stars all the time. The Oscars move so slow you'd think they're an advertisement for crock pots. If it was screened for a studio head, it would never get a release. First and foremost it's entertainment, you want people to watch, SO MAKE IT ENTERTAINING!

Furthermore, no one cares who wins the small awards. Give 'em out fast and get 'em over with, or just televise the awards people care about, like the Grammys. We don't care about your stinking short. In an era of blockbusters, we only want what flies above. As for tech people... Engineers are key to recordings, but they don't get airtime on the Grammys.

RIGHT

Few awards. No, this is not a contradiction. The Grammys have way too many categories. Winning is not special. There are businessmen who have many, even Presidents. If you haven't been nominated for a Grammy, you don't make music.

WRONG

Letting advertising trump essence.

We're subjected to months of meaningless ads trumpeting films for victory but there's very little focus on the films themselves, we don't get long clips until the Oscar show itself. Make twenty minutes available online. Have documentaries detailing what the not on screen people do. They call it the Information Age, but all the Academy delivers is hype. And gloss. We want the seamy underside, and I don't mean who slept with who, although we want that too, but how these films got made. Have Scorsese testify about the making of "The Wolf Of Wall Street." Christian Bale talking about how he prepared for his role in "American Hustle." Build some culture around the nominees, it will benefit both the show and movies, for without culture you've got nothing.

RIGHT

Ad libs. Live is all about spontaneity. We don't want it perfect, but memorable. About all I remember from last year's show is Jennifer Lawrence tripping on the way up to win her award.

WRONG

No fan involvement. You want us to watch, but you don't let us get involved. How about a contest wherein winners get Academy screeners? And the person with screeners who gets the most categories right gets to go to the show the following year and be on camera. We live in a social world, but the Oscars are not social. They're all about exclusivity. And those involved don't realize we're making fun of them behind their backs.

RIGHT

Tradition. It adds gravitas.

WRONG

Giving awards to those who don't deserve one. Oprah? Doesn't she have enough money and accolades? Wanna honor her, let her host! That's what she's famous for, that's what she know how to do.

RIGHT

Jack Nicholson. Because he's known for doing it his way, and he's cool.

WRONG

The sycophantic TV hosts who we don't know the name of and are so busy fawning over the stars we want to puke. And if I hear one more idiot asking "Who are you wearing..." Shouldn't there be an app for that?

RIGHT

Limiting the endless speeches wherein the winner thanks everybody who might get them another job.

WRONG

Playing off the people we actually want to hear. Can't someone make a judgment as to who is actually interesting and let them keep going?

Or, instead of playing people off, give awards for the speeches...shortest, most intriguing, funniest... Get the public to vote and give cash prizes that are donated to the winner's charity of choice.

WRONG

Length. It's kind of like George Carlin's riff on baseball...we don't know when it's gonna end, it could go on FOREVER! It's a relief when it's finally over. And give Trent Reznor props for bitching about being cut off at the Grammys, no one will say a negative word tonight, because they're afraid they'll never work again.

WRONG

The air of formality. They play derelicts by day but we're supposed to respect them at night? Can't someone come in a t-shirt, can't someone say something dangerous?

WRONG

The production numbers. You can't sell a movie musical, but one night a year, when everybody's watching, you subject them to endless minutes of dancing and warbling... Ugh.

WRONG

Casting past winners on the scrapheap. If you've ever won, you deserve a ticket. Yes, I'm talking about you Mira Sorvino.

WRONG

The delay between the end of the year and this show. The NFL only takes two weeks off before the Super Bowl, why does the Academy take two months?

WRONG

The failure of most people to see most of the nominees. Everything that's nominated should play on Netflix, for a month, a week, maybe even a day. Yup, the Sunday night before, everything is free online. Can you imagine the mass hysteria? De La Soul gives away ancient music online for free and everybody knows about it, the Academy airs the Oscars and most people will NEVER see the movies.

WRONG

Faux respect. Just because you made it, just because you're in the building, that does not mean we've got to make nice, especially since so many are money-grubbing pricks. MTV realized controversy sells their yearly VMAs, we all remember when RuPaul and Milton Berle got into it, we remember almost nothing about recent Oscar telecasts other than...that streaker before most of the wannabe audience was born.

WRONG

The producers. All caught up in movie glory, all the crap no one cares about. Give credit to Ken Ehrlich, at least he knows the Grammys are a TV show! You hire a professional to do a job, not someone who's never done it before. Ever notice the movie stars are wooden live? Which is why we don't get them to host, they suck. Just ask James Franco.

WRONG

The inability to acknowledge most of us watch most of our movies at home. Hell, who wants to go to a theatre with texting and sticky floors and start times that are never convenient. How about a new award for MOST STREAMED! Or at least release some data as part of the run-up to the telecast.

RIGHT

TCM's 31 days of Oscar. The channel respects films in a way the Academy does not. It's about the picture, stupid. And that's based on the plot. And if you want people to respect the art, you've got to make it. You've got to enable artists and stop funding comic book action flicks whilst complaining your hands are tied.

BOTTOM LINE

The Oscar show, like the movies themselves, are in terminal decline. As for 2013 being a renaissance, that's like saying One Direction is a better boy band than New Kids On The Block. If you think everybody is talking about movies, you're in the "industry." It's a closed shop that more and more tune out. Let us inside. Mystery is history, it went away with the Internet. No one's on a pedestal anymore, certainly not these two-dimensional actors who are constantly committing faux pas in public.

Story is king.

As for the story of these Oscars... What is it again?


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