A Hollywood ending: Low-drama ceremony caps exciting and historic Oscar season

Courtesy of ABC

Ke Huy Quan won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in “Everything Everywhere All At Once.”

Before the 95th Academy Awards aired on March 12, I remarked that this year’s Oscars have no reason to fail like previous years. Marred in recent years by slap scandals and poor production — an awards plague that also ransacked sister shows like the Golden Globes — this year looked different, with a lot of positive outlooks on deck. And, luckily, it delivered a true Hollywood ending.

Hosted by late-night comedian Jimmy Kimmel and produced by television veterans Ricky Kirshner and Glenn Weiss, the show was a return to form and proper prestige. Critically acclaimed (and actually popular) movies took home the top prizes, while four actors with emotional stories rocked the Dolby Theater stage. And the production, though still long, moved at a better pace than ever before, incorporating every award plus some new pieces with great future potential.

Yes, there are those who will undoubtedly complain about this year’s show for whatever multitude of reasons they can create, but the reality is that this telecast was the best of any Academy Awards in recent history. It’s supported by data too: 18.8 million people tuned into the Oscars, a 13% increase from last year and the highest rating for the show in three years.

In my preview, I declared that “Everything Everywhere All At Once” was the by far and away best movie of last year and the most deserving of Best Picture. The Academy agreed: The film took home seven Academy Awards, including the prestigious top prize of Best Picture, with its directors (Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, known as The Daniels) also winning Best Director and Best Original Screenplay. “Everything Everywhere All At Once” also made history as the most awarded movie in history, according to an analysis by IGN. 

And I couldn’t be happier for the film. When it first came out in March 2022 — it was actually released before last year’s Oscars, but fell into this year’s nomination window — most disregarded its chances at awards a full year later. But much like the theme of the movie and the cast and crew involved, “Everything Everywhere All At Once” overcame the odds. The movie is weird, quirky and arguably insane, but it’s also mainstream enough to cross appeal — this isn’t a typical film, and it’s worth seeing just to see it.

The Daniels weren’t the only ones to benefit from the Best Picture bump. Even the film’s editor, Paul Rogers, won Best Editing for his chaotic work, which he completed using basic Adobe Premiere Pro software on an old iMac. 

Michelle Yeoh (“Everything Everywhere All At Once”) bested Cate Blanchett (“Tar”) to win Best Actress, making her the first Asian woman and second person of color after Halle Berry to ever win the award — not to mention her career-defining performance in the film and superstar body of work. 

Ke Huy Quan (“Everything Everywhere All At Once”) took the award for Best Supporting Actor, completing what he emotionally proclaimed “the American Dream.” Quan first began acting as a child in “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom” opposite Harrison Ford, but soon lost his guild health insurance and was put out of work in a Hollywood that didn’t support many Asian actors, only to triumphantly return at the Oscars — and give Ford a huge hug on stage. His performance wasn’t just the best supporting performance of the year (he was the emotional core of his film): It represented one of the best success stories Hollywood has to offer.

Lastly, Jamie Lee Curtis (“Everything Everywhere All At Once”) bested her own co-star Stephanie Hsu and powerhouse Angela Bassett (“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”) to win Best Supporting Actress. Unfortunately, while Curtis is a fantastic actress — and an even better awards speech giver — her performance simply paled in comparison to the favored Bassett’s; Curtis wasn’t even the best supporting actress in her movie — that would be Hsu. That being said, given Curtis’s body of work, it’s not an egregious error on the Academy’s part.

In the Best Actor department, Brendan Fraser won for his role in “The Whale,” beating out my personal favorite Austin Butler in “Elvis” — both actors were great, but both movies weren’t the best. Fraser completed a first-time winner sweep of the acting categories, as he, Curtis, Quan and Yeoh all took home their first Oscars ever.

To be honest, there isn’t much to complain about the awards themselves, especially the major category winners. The only questionable awards were those given to “All Quiet on the Western Front,” which won Best Cinematography, Best Production Design and Best Score, despite not deserving the latter two at all. In addition, “Women Talking” won Best Adapted Screenplay for its script that really focused on most screenplay than best (the movie lives up to its title and truly is 104 minutes of women talking in a room) — “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” was a far more deserving pick here.

Now turning to the show itself: not bad, not perfect.

This year’s Oscars focused almost exclusively on running a smooth show and preventing disasters — think The Slap Heard ‘Round the World — rather than trying to do anything special. You can’t blame them for this direction — and, for the most part, it worked out too.

Unfortunately for the show, major A-list guests James Cameron and Tom Cruise were unable to take the time to attend. Who knows, maybe they had a legitimate reason, even if all Hollywood insiders are pointing otherwise. But considering both Cameron and Cruise positioned themselves as saviors of the industry when their films “Avatar: The Way of Water” and “Top Gun: Maverick,” respectively, were released, it’s a bad look that they couldn’t bother to attend the industry’s celebration. 

Kimmel, in his third rodeo as host, hit the right notes in his monologue, which successfully produced laughs without disrespecting any of the nominated films or the industry itself. Some may prefer a Ricky Gervais-type host, but at a show honoring the film industry’s best, it feels disrespectful to have a host that rips the industry apart — Kimmel chose the right path.

The award presenters also may have added some chuckles throughout the night, but they single-handedly burned the show’s clock. Sure, bringing out celebrities to introduce the awards helps make the show more interesting and allows producers enough time to prepare the stage, but it also takes up a crazy amount of time. It’s hard to justify cutting off winners’ speeches when presenters are rambling for twice the amount of time before the award is presented, especially when the winners’ speeches were often far more moving and interesting.

The performances throughout the show were also disappointing. The performance of “Naatu Naatu” — the dance sensation from “RRR” that deservedly won the Best Song award — was underwhelming, especially given the lack of Tamil and Indian talent on stage. Adding on, the “Everything Everywhere All At Once” song (which I don’t remember and don’t care to learn about) was downright horrible.

On a more positive note, this year’s Oscars were directed by television veterans Kirshner and Weiss, as noted at the top of the story. With previous years being directed by members of the film industry, Kirshner and Weiss brought noticeable change. The transitions were smoother and the show ran much faster — this year’s telecast included three more awards and new promotional features, but still clocked in around the same time as last year’s telecast.

Furthermore, in an attempt to boost viewership, the Oscars began including advertisements from major movie studios directly into the show, such as Disney’s “The Little Mermaid” live-action remake trailer and Warner Brothers 100-year celebration montage.

You can call these inserts a cash grab, which considering they cost between $7 million and $10 million each, they are. But they have serious potential. The Oscars are simply no longer a major event, and they need something to entice normal people to watch them. Trailers are a huge deal and they attract significant attention; just look at the Game Awards, which has built a major show from the ground up, primarily due to trailer and first-look participation from major game studios. 

This year was just a step, but I do hope they continue in the direction of incorporating more trailers into the show. These trailers shouldn’t be studio celebrations, and they shouldn’t only come from Disney, the parent company of ABC. It’s just simple: An Oscars with new trailers and footage from “The Little Mermaid,” “Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning,” “Oppenheimer” and “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” is far more exciting than an Oscars without.

And that brings me to the end. With a great show and even better winners, the Oscars have a lot to look forward to. But they’re still irrelevant in modern pop culture. It’s not an exaggeration when I say I was the only person among my friends and family excited to watch.

The show delivered on all its expectations plus a little more. But come next year, the Academy and Oscar producers need to begin making the show more exciting for everyone. You can only have a Hollywood ending if people see the movie in the first place.