After 85 years, Oscars still need to find niche in award show season

The Academy Awards — also known as the Oscars — have without a doubt set a precedent for other award shows. As the oldest ceremony recognizing Hollywood achievements, the Oscars show is the papa bear of the Grammys, Tony Awards and Emmy Awards. This year, now officially renamed the Oscars, the ceremony took place at Dolby Theater in Hollywood on Feb. 24.

The night did not lack in memorable performances by the attendees: Jennifer Lawrence executed an un-Katniss-like stumble up the steps to receive her Oscar as Best Actress, Kristin Chenoweth and host Seth MacFarlane sang a “To the Losers” song, and the cast of “Les Miserables” performed a spectacular medley of all the songs from the inspiring movie (yes, I’m a fan).

However, the 2013 Oscars was somewhat lackluster compared to the earlier award ceremonies this year. With eight other similar shows all fighting for audience views during award show season, the Oscars cannot merely rely on seniority to rake in the views.

First of all, the show lacks a specific target audience. Unlike the Grammys or the People’s Choice Awards, both of which target young-adult viewers, the previously called Academy Awards tries to cater to both older and younger audiences. In fact, the switch to the show title “The Oscars” was an attempt to attract the attention of young adults.

The confusion in the show’s identity has resulted in mixed reactions from viewers. For example, though some deemed host Seth MacFarlane’s jokes sarcastic and funny, others thought they were rude and offensive. Such jokes ranged from the poke at Jews in Hollywood and Macfarlane’s rendition of the song, “We Saw Your Boobs,” poking fun at specific actresses that have appeared nude in films.

Additionally, though all the winners may look different, most share one thing in common: their acceptance speeches. With a 45-second time limit, the celebrities have turned the supposedly emotional acceptance speech into a race to see how many names the winner can rattle off within the time slot. Although the winner’s gratitude is genuine, the 45 seconds are meaningless to the audience, as we have no idea who the listed people are anyway (does anyone actually know, or care about, Ang Lee’s lawyer?).

Also, who knows what “The Academy” actually is? Sure, it’s an obscure group of people who somehow feel justified to judge other artists’ work, but what gives the Academy the right to do this? The winners are selected through a voting process that only Academy members can participate in. Specific names of Academy members are not disclosed to the public (Academy member Viola Davis revealed to the LA Times that even she doesn’t know who her fellow members are).

One look at the demographics of the Oscar voting panel reveals clear biases in the judging process. The median age of voters is 62, 94 percent of them are Caucasian, and 77 percent are male.

This voter demographic clearly does not represent the American movie-watching population, which somewhat explains why people of color (like Suraj Sharma in “Life of Pi” and Viola Davis in “The Help”) so rarely win Oscars.                            

Overall, the Oscars is just a plain award show with a few “haha” moments interspersed throughout. The Grammys attracts audiences with stunning performances by world-famous artists; the Oscars also hosted a few talented singers, but the overall performance and stage presence of singers at the Oscars pales in comparison to performances at the Grammys. The Oscars also lacks the involvement of the general public that the People’s Choice Awards allows.

Without finding its niche within the swarm of award shows, the Oscars just seems like an elitist award show, with trophies awarded from an elitist panel of elitists from the mysterious “Academy.”