Oscar Recap

 Well, wasn't that exciting?

We'll get to it, don't you worry.  But first, can we just acknowledge the utter irony of ABC trying desperately to raise ratings by adding stupid audience participation categories and taking out long-established ones when they could have just hired a couple of Real Housewives to mud wrestle?

So Ariana DuBose won Best Supporting Actress, which was nice, and she gave a lovely speech.

Dune won Best Sound, Best Cinematography, Best Visual Effects, Best Original Score, Best Film Editing, and Best Production Design.  Not bad for a plucky little... mainstream box office smash that made over $400 million.  But the Academy doesn't reward popular films!

Encanto won Best Animated Feature.  

The Windshield Wiper won Best Animated Short.  

The Queen of Basketball won Best Documentary Short.

Troy Kotsur won Best Supporting Actor with another stellar speech.

Zach Snyder's Justice League won Most Cheer Worthy and probably Most Likely to Sign Your Yearbook "See You Next Year" Even Though You've Never Spoken to Him.  (They're adding that category next year.)

Drive My Car won Best International Feature.

The Long Goodbye won Best Live Action Short.

Cruella won Best Costume Design.

Kenneth Branagh won Best Original Screenplay for Belfast.

Sîan Heder won Best Adapted Screenplay for Coda.

And here's where it all went off the rails.  To present the award for Best Documentary Feature, Chris Rock came out and told a couple of off-the-cuff jokes.  One was about Jada Pinkett-Smith auditioning for G.I. Jane 2.  Pinkett-Smith had shaved her head (and looked great, btw) because she has alopecia as a result of an autoimmune disorder.  Her husband, Will Smith, walked on stage and open-handed slapped Chris Rock in the face.

Chaos ensued.

(Mostly on Twitter.  The actual audience did not really react.)  Hell, Chris Rock barely reacted.  

I thought it was faked but the lightning reporters of international Twitter posted the uncensored clip where Smith can clearly be heard telling Rock to "keep my wife's name out of your fucking mouth" and film Twitter was just as quick to post stills showing The Slap.  

Summer of Soul won, by the way.  

The broadcast cut to commercial and everything resumed as normal.

Billie Eilish and Finneas won Best Original Song.

Jane Campion won a historic second Best Director Oscar as a female director.  

Probably could have been smoothed over if Will Smith had not subsequently won Best Actor.  He gave a highly emotional speech where he apologized to everyone except Chris Rock, launching a second flurry of tweets.

So, to recap, a 53-year-old multimillionaire actor slapped a 57-year-old multimillionaire comedian on live television, over a lame, ableist joke, then defended himself in a speech awarded by a multibillion dollar industry invoking the chivalric practice of defending his woman with violence.  And they said no one watched The Last Duel!

The Eyes of Tammy Faye won Best Hair and Makeup, Jessica Chastain won Best Actress, and Coda won Best Picture.  All of which were overshadowed by the elephant in the room.

But I would like to also point out that Chris Rock was not the only comedian there playing whack-a-mole with low-hanging fruit.  Host Regina Hall had a gag where she, as a desperate horny lady, "frisked" presenters Josh Brolin and Jason Momoa.  That was probably scripted and I would hope that both actors agreed ahead of time, but I could not help thinking that A) that was a tired, overused joke and B) if it had been a male host feeling up two female presenters, they would have tied him to the bumper of a limo and dragged him down Hollywood Boulevard (but still invited him to the Vanity Fair party after, because you don't want to be rude.)

Anyway, what a total fucking trainwreck.  Can't wait for next year!