The 93rd Academy Awards: Recap and Reactions
Daniel Kaluuya, winner of the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in Judas and the Black Messiah.
Overview
The 93rd Academy Awards were held this past Sunday in an unusual way. After the industry was so greatly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, some wondered whether or not the Oscars would air at all. But, as they say in show business, “the show must go on,” and go on it did. Just one of the many odd quirks was that instead of the ceremony being held in the famous Dolby Theatre - the dazzling, 3,400-seat venue where the awards have been held since 2002 - the show found a new home in...Union Station. Yes, you read that right: the 2021 Academy Awards were held in a train station.
The location change also meant an obvious and necessary change to the guest list. Typically, the Oscars are a star-studded night filled with glitz and glamour, where a commercial break trip to the bathroom may result in you bumping elbows with Jennifer Lawrence or Brad Pitt. Instead, only 170 people were invited to the ceremony, with many nominees joining in live via video from Europe and Australia. The make-shift arrangements required the show to reconsider how it filmed and staged the production, and Hollywood vets Steven Soderbergh, Stacey Sher, and Jesse Collins were put in charge of the task. The trio opted to shoot as if the ceremony was a film itself, with a credits-laden, long tracking shot of Regina King opening the show, and a documentary-style approach to the winner announcements as a lone cameraman walked amongst the stars shooting their reactions handheld.
Yuh-Jung Youn and Brad Pitt.
As has been the pattern for the last couple of ceremonies, they opted out of having a designated host for the evening, instead delegating the tasks to random movie stars. The flow of this wasn’t entirely awful, but a single host to act as the through-line for this messy, three-hour broadcast may have helped to make it feel more cohesive.
THE BIG WINS
Throughout the chaos, there were several incredible and historic wins for the evening. Chloe Zhao, who received her awards for Best Director and Best Picture for “Nomadland”, became not only the second woman ever to be nominated for and receive the former award, but also the first woman of color to ever take it home. Another win for the girls came by way of Mia Neal and Jamika Wilson, who won for Best Makeup and Hairstyling for “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom”. The duo became the first black women to ever be nominated for and win the award, and Ann Roth, who won for the same film’s Costume Design, became the oldest woman to ever win an Oscar at age eighty-nine. Writer-director Emerald Fennell took home the first award of the evening for Best Original Screenplay for her film, Promising Young Woman, and Adapted Screenplay went to “The Father” (wherein the screenwriter-director, Florian Zeller, wrote the role specifically for star Anthony Hopkins).
Daniel Kaluuya earned his much-deserved Best Supporting Actor award for “Judas And The Black Messiah”, with the film also taking home Best Original Song. Awards season favorite Yuh-Jung Youn won Best Supporting Actress for her charming and emotional performance in “Minari”, becoming the first woman of Korean descent to win the award. Pixar’s jazzy new film “Soul” took home both Best Animated Feature Film and Best Original Score, while the Mads Mikkelsen-led “Another Round” took home Best International Feature Film. “Sound Of Metal” was awarded Best Achievement in Film Editing and Best Achievement in Sound. “Tenet”, the Christopher Nolan summer blockbuster that brought us back to the movies, took home Best Visual Effects after being shockingly snubbed for a nomination in most other categories at the ceremony. “Mank”, the ritzy, dazzling period piece from acclaimed director David Fincher, won for Best Cinematography and Best Production Design. Jack-of-all-trades Tyler Perry was given the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award, an honorary Oscar, for his humanitarian work. He dedicated his speech to the idea of “refusing hate,” and used his platform to inspire others to make change in the world.
Tyler Perry, recipient of the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.
In previous ceremonies, the Best Picture category was always saved for the final moments of the show, so that the credits rolled with dozens of stars and producers on stage, celebrating what is typically viewed as the biggest win of the night. Instead, the ceremony opted to hold the Best Actress and Best Actor categories for last, throwing off the entire show and seemingly revealing a spoiler for the winner. The Best Actor category had been a hot topic this year, not only due to the immaculate performances, but because actor Chadwick Boseman (best known as Black Panther in the Marvel Cinematic Universe) tragically passed away in August of 2020. His nomination for his performance in “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” was not only a career-best, but was seen as a perfect tribute to his life should he win. Boseman had been winning the gold at many other award shows, including the BAFTA and the Golden Globe, and most had thought he would be a shoo-in for the Oscar. After a zany, yet on-brand speech from winner Frances McDormand, who took home Best Actress for her role in “Nomadland”, the momentum built to what was sure to be an emotional close for the show as viewers expected to hear Boseman’s name called. Instead, the statue was awarded to Hopkins, who turned in an intimate and heart-breaking performance in “The Father”. As audience members and viewers at home sat in shock, the ceremony ended abruptly, with last year’s Best Actor winner Joaquin Phoenix being awkwardly forced to accept the award on behalf of Hopkins, who had been denied a video acceptance speech by the Academy due to their strict no-Zoom rule for the ceremony.
While Hopkins’ win would have been more widely celebrated any other year, the profound sadness surrounding Boseman’s death turned his nomination into a universal rally for his win. Hopkins even became the oldest actor to ever win the award, yet the confusion and shock for his unexpected victory sadly overshadowed his achievement. Hopkins posted a video the following day expressing gratitude for his win and paying tribute to Boseman.
Glenn Close, nominee for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Hillbilly Elegy.
Prior to such an anti-climactic ending for the show, the awkward and forced moments in-between may have been even worse than the ending. Take, for instance, a partially-scripted comedy bit in the third hour of the ceremony where actor and comedian Lil Rey Howery walked around having nominees guess whether or not certain songs that were played by the evening’s DJ, Questlove, were nominated for an Oscar, won an Oscar, or neither. This dry, overlong, and unfunny bit reached its peak when eight-time Oscar nominee Glenn Close stood up and began twerking: yet another performance that still won’t earn her the award.
Further downfalls of the show were the lack of clips before the winners were announced. Usually a clip from each film is played, highlighting the performer or the movie itself to give viewers a reminder of why it was nominated in the first place. It didn’t just feel disruptive from the usual flow, it forced viewers to rely strictly on memory if they had seen the film, or gave them absolutely zero context if they hadn’t seen it. Another major change was the decision to omit the cut-off music during the acceptance speeches. The limited time that winners have to thank everyone on their roster before the swell of music eventually mutes their microphone has since become a running joke during the ceremony, but now creators had free roam to thank as many people as they wanted. Though earned, at times it dragged on too long; so finding a middle ground during next year’s ceremony would be worth considering.
Frances McDormand, winner of the Academy Award for Best Actress, and Chloe Zhao, winner of the Academy Award for Best Director, both for Nomadland.
Perhaps the greatest offense of all was the “In Memoriam” section. A time during the ceremony where fellow artists are meant to be honored and remembered, typically accompanied with the lights down and a live performance, this year’s dedication flashed by instead like a cheap montage put together by a producer’s relative. The names flashed by so quickly that there was hardly time to mourn or process any of them, and the upbeat Stevie Wonder song they used felt like a terrible misread of the room.
If the poor moments themselves weren’t enough to make the case for this year’s ceremony being an all-time worst, the numbers speak for themselves: the 93rd Academy Awards were the lowest-viewed and lowest-rated broadcast in the show’s history, with just around ten million people tuning in. Next year, the show is set to return to the Dolby Theatre in its February timeslot with a hopeful return to its roots, but with all of the cynicism and apathy that already surrounded the Oscars, the damage may already be done.