ATLANTA – Pull the plug. It’s time to let go. The patient is rapidly failing.
It’s time for Uncle Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Aunt ABC and the rest of Hollywood’s dysfunctional family to come to the only sensible conclusion: Stop televising the Oscars.
Cancel them completely? Heavens, no. Every profession has its annual confab with self-congratulatory awards and entertainment. If big-name Hollywood-ers, whose day jobs involve getting completely dressed and scripted by others, want to attend a professional gathering where they’re completely dressed and scripted by others, let ’em.
Just don’t make us watch it.
In its place, give us unexpected, entertaining prime-time network programming. A new “Desperate Housewives.” More old self-proclaimed Anna Nicole lovers playing “Who’s Your Daddy?” Even the 9 millionth episode of “America’s Funniest Home Videos,” which, for all its “cat got flushed down the toilet” dopiness, never forgets it’s a TV show governed by basic watchability rules: – Don’t last four hours.
– Schedule some surprises (the official accountants’ arrival doesn’t count).
– Steer clear of anything involving interpretive tap-dancing or the phrase “In Memoriam.” Stop televising the Oscars? No chance, experts say.
“What you’re talking about is greed,” says Nikki Finke, who writes the pull-no-punches “Deadline Hollywood” column and blog (deadlinehollywooddaily.com). “It’s the Movie Bowl for ABC.
They’re asking a fortune for ads and churning out hour upon hour of mind-numbing television. And the academy isn’t going to do anything to change it, because it’s what they make their money on.” Still ? last year’s audience of 38.9 million, the second smallest in nearly two decades, means ratings are plunging like the queen’s in “The Queen” – and she basically danced on the grave of the People’s Princess! Meanwhile, multiple nominations for the little-seen likes of “Pan’s Labyrinth” and “Babel” have many consumers thinking it’s all some colossal hoax perpetrated by Borat ($128 million box office, one kissing-your-cousin nomination for best adapted screenplay).
“Ryan Gosling’s movie played in 106 theaters and made $2 million,” Finke says of “Half Nelson’s” best actor nominee.
“There are more nail salons within a quarter-mile of my house than theaters that played his movie. How can people relate?” Worse, how can we have Oscar pools anymore? Raise your hand if you don’t already know who will win tonight’s major acting awards.
And what they will say: Nothing we haven’t heard before at the Golden Globes or SAG awards.
“It’s like a big business meeting,” says Joan Rivers, the comedian who does red-carpet interviews for TV Guide Channel.
“Everyone acts like they’re visiting Grandpa. They’re on their best behavior.” And it shows – all over our plasma screens. We’re stuck watching a show that can’t seem to get it through its thick, highlighted head that it’s not a Merchant-Ivory movie. That’s why everything ABC and the academy have halfheartedly tried recently – hiring smart-aleck host Jon Stewart last year, going into the audience two years ago to practically hurl statues at obscure technical category winners – hasn’t worked.
Part of the problem is not letting stars do what they do best: These are performers with their own particular styles. (And, even better sometimes, their own particular lack of style.) But you’d never know it from watching the Manchurian Oscars. No one gets dressed now without consulting a team of tasteful experts, and no presenter gets to go off the dinner theater-caliber script.
Contrast that with Gnarls Barkley’s rafter-rattling live performance of “Crazy” on CBS’ recent Grammys. Maybe you didn’t love the choice of backing choir or wardrobe – airline pilots uniforms circa the “Coffee, Tea or Me?” era – but you had no doubt it was all theirs.
Perhaps it’s unreasonable to expect tonight’s attendees to re-enact “Notes on a Scandal” or “Talladega Nights.” And, judging by the blank or sourpuss looks from some of our more noted thespians when a red-carpet chat or Oscar monologue takes a slightly unexpected turn, you don’t want to leave them on their own too long.
But is it too much to demand a more entertaining show from an industry that’s supposedly all about creativity and knowing what the customer wants? There’s plenty that could be done to improve the show – air it a month earlier, have the nominated writers script it – but nothing will change until everyone acknowledges what Oscar night really is: A TV show.
That just happens to be about the movies.
“The people who produce the show are movie people,” Finke laments. “It’s a television broadcast! Give it to someone like 1/8″Survivor” creator 3/8 Mark Burnett. He’ll pit Young Hollywood vs.
Old Hollywood. ? Throw the Oscar in the middle of the stage and let them fight for it. Now that’s television.” And prime-time network TV is creative. And even more calculating. The same medium that dreamed up “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” and built on-air institutions like “Miss America” had no problem pulling the plug when their ratings plunged.
Stop televising the Oscars? Maybe not just yet.
But keep airing the same old show and you should get ready for another “crazy” notion: “In Memoriam: The Oscars on Network Television.”
