Welcome back to ON THE LOT.
Today’s special Oscars edition, which was filed from a perch at the lobby bar of the Dolby Theatre, is co-helmed by senior news reporter Daniel Arkin.
Got tips (on Tom Cruise’s 2027 Oscar campaign for “Diggers,” or how to get these fake eyelashes off)? You can reach me at rebecca.keegan@nbcuni.com or on Signal at thatrebecca.82.
One win after another
A quiet moment in the noisy bar at the Dolby Theatre on Sunday night crystallized the feeling many people in Hollywood have at the end of Oscar season.
“We can breathe again,” Stellan Skarsgård (“Sentimental Value”) said to Jacob Elordi (“Frankenstein”), as the two nominees for supporting actor hugged and expressed relief about not having to deliver a speech. They had just lost to Sean Penn (“One Battle After Another”), who didn’t even attend the show.
Much of the drama of this awards season has been the back-and-forth between two well-loved films, “One Battle After Another” and “Sinners,” which dueled all night. “One Battle” ultimately won six awards, including best picture, and “Sinners” collected four awards, including best actor. There was a particular poignance to the dominance of the two movies, both made for a 103-year-old studio — Warner Bros. — that has just been acquired by Paramount Skydance and is expected to change radically if that merger goes through.
As awards season winds down, this Oscars gave us lots of moments to remember. Here are just a few …
In a tight best actor field, Michael B. Jordan prevailed
The race for best actor was one of the night’s true nail-biters.
Timothée Chalamet seemed to have early awards season momentum for his turn as a cocky table tennis player in “Marty Supreme,” scooping up prizes from the Golden Globes and the Critics’ Choice Awards, but Jordan, the star of “Sinners,” upended expectations with his upset victory at the Screen Actors Guild’s Actor Awards.
In the end, Jordan carried the day. He took the main stage at the Dolby Theatre to thunderous applause and a standing ovation, and he used his speech to pay tribute to previous Black Oscar winners, including Sidney Poitier, Denzel Washington and Halle Berry. “God is good,” Jordan said.
Paul Thomas Anderson finally gets his due from the academy
In the minds of some critics, Paul Thomas Anderson is the greatest living American director, a maverick who fuses classical filmmaking traditions with his own distinctive vision. He established himself as a folk hero to cinephiles with “Boogie Nights,” “There Will Be Blood,” “Phantom Thread” and other seminal work, but Oscar glory eluded him — until Sunday night.
Anderson was one of the ceremony’s biggest winners, taking home prizes for best adapted screenplay, best director and, at the climax of the 3½-hour telecast, best picture.
“You make a guy work hard for one of these,” Anderson joked at the top of his best director acceptance speech.
Conan O’Brien strikes the right tone
The comedian, making his sophomore outing as host, kicked off the show with a nod to the rise of AI: “I’m honored to be the last human host of the Academy Awards,” he joked. “Next year it’s going to be a Waymo in a tux.”
He peppered his monologue with other topical one-liners before pivoting to a more earnest tone, saying in part that viewers were “all too aware that these are very chaotic, frightening times.” But in troubling “moments like these,” he added, the Oscars can be “particularly resonant.”
“We pay tribute tonight not just to film, but to the ideals of global artistry, collaboration, patience, resilience and that rarest of qualities today: optimism,” O’Brien said to applause.
International conflict and political battles loom large
The ceremony had many pointed comments about the sociopolitical climate at home and abroad. The most explicit: Javier Bardem, presenting the award for best international film, leaned into the microphone and said, “No to war, and free Palestine.”
Jimmy Kimmel, introducing films nominated in the documentary categories, alluded to “some countries whose leaders don’t support free speech. I’m not at liberty to say which.” He added: “Let’s just leave it at North Korea and CBS.”
David Borenstein, accepting the documentary feature prize for “Mr. Nobody Against Putin” described his film as a chronicle of “how you lose your country.” He went on to say: “It’s that you lose it through countless small little acts of complicity.”
In Memoriam: Reiner, Keaton, Redford and others
Billy Crystal eulogized the late director Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele Singer Reiner, who were killed Dec. 14. Crystal surveyed key entries in Reiner’s directorial filmography, including “Stand by Me,” “The Princess Bride” and “When Harry Met Sally.”
“My friend Rob’s movies will last a lifetime, because they’re about what make us laugh and cry, and what we aspire to be,” Crystal said in part.
Rachel McAdams took the stage to pay tribute to Oscar-winning screen legend Diane Keaton, who died Oct. 11 at 79. “Believe me when I say there isn’t an actress of my generation who was not inspired by and enthralled with her absolute singularity,” McAdams said.
Barbra Streisand spoke at length about her co-star and friend Robert Redford, who died Sept. 16 at 89, before capping off the “In Memoriam” segment with a rendition of “The Way We Were.” “I miss him now more than ever, even though he loved teasing me,” Streisand said.
By the numbers
Compiled by NBC News culture & trends editor Saba Hamedy
- 3½: The length of this year’s show, in hours.
- 6: The final Oscar tally for “One Battle After Another,” which took home the most awards Sunday.
- 7: The number of times there’s been a tie in Oscars history, including this year’s best live-action short film winners: “The Singers” and “Two People Exchanging Saliva.”
- 11: The total number of Oscars won by Warner Bros., helping the company tie the record for most wins by a studio in a single night.
- 17: The number of times legendary songwriter Diane Warren has lost her bid for an Oscar.
- 700: The approximate number of crew members who worked during the telecast, according to the academy.
- 2,000: The number of mini chocolate Oscars made by caterer Wolfgang Puck for the evening’s festivities.
Inside the room where it happened
The trick to packing for the Oscars as a journalist is bringing as little as possible while still packing the bare necessities.
That includes: My notebook and pen; a portable charger; a mini microphone (to shoot content); my phone; Altoids; Advil; makeup (my go-tos: Charlotte Tilbury compact powder, Make-Up by Mario lipstick) and Q-tips for touch-ups; and a mini ziplock bag with macadamia nuts and dried cherries (you never know when you’re going to eat at these events).
After packing my bag, I drove to the Dolby Theatre in full glam, where I encountered a 1-mile perimeter of street closures around the theater, bomb-sniffing dogs and heavy police presence. It felt similar to recent years, although the road closure was wider.
Once we got to our seats, we were greeted with boxes. The contents included: Swedish fish, popcorn, water and a note from Conan O’Brien.
“I hope you enjoy this Conan O’Brien ‘Moderately Happy Meal,’” the host wrote in his notes, joking that at a movie theater the snacks would have cost $85. “Remember that loud, enthusiastic laughter is good for your health and my ego,” the note added.
Ruh-roh
While the rest of us were watching Jordan’s acceptance speech, the Screen Actors Guild and the Alliance of Motion Picture Television Producers issued a joint statement saying they are pausing their contract negotiations.
On a celebratory night like the Oscars, the statement was a reminder of how tenuous the entertainment industry can still feel in the U.S., less than three years since the last actors and writers strike.
SAG and AMPTP said they had “completed productive bargaining sessions, including going several days beyond what was originally planned,” but that they are now going to pause formal talks until spring.
That’s because the studios are moving on to start bargaining with the Writers Guild on Monday, the guild that is usually the thorniest negotiation, before then moving on to the Directors Guild on May 11.
Concerns around artificial intelligence, residuals, pension and health plans are all on the table for the writers, whose guild is in the midst of its own messy labor dispute with its own staff.
SAG and the AMPTP said they will resume their bargaining later this spring, before the current contract SAG expires June 30.
The dialogue (Oscars version)
“Animation is more than a prompt, it’s an art form, and it needs to be protected. Am I right?” — Actor Will Arnett, while presenting the animation awards onstage.
“Jackie is more than just a headline. She is our light and life. Gun violence is now the No. 1 cause of death in kids and teens. We believe if the world could see their empty bedrooms, we’d be a different America.” — Gloria Cazares, talking about her daughter who was killed in the elementary school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, in 2022. She was onstage to accept the award for “All the Empty Rooms,” a short doc about children killed in school shootings.
“What a night! Let’s have a martini!” — “One Battle After Another” director Paul Thomas Anderson, after winning an Oscar.
That’s a wrap — see you Friday!
