[March 6, 2006]

Well, that was a… ceremony. I gotta say I was kind of underwhelmed by this year’s Academy Awards. The speeches weren’t exciting, there weren’t any big upsets, Sally Kirkland was nowhere to be seen on the red carpet (come ON!) and, as much as I love Jon Stewart, I found him kind of meh. With the exception of Meryl Streep and Lily Tomlin’s small bit of theater (which was hilarious and great!) and the negative-ad nominee-campaigning spots (which were brilliant!), there weren’t any extremes of loving or loathing, just lots of middling moments. Here instead, then, are some of the comments and questions that popped up for me over the course of the evening…

1. Who told Keira Knightley that slouching is sexy? Did you see her vamping for the photogs on her way in? She’d stand, hunch her shoulders forward and then pose for a few seconds. Take three steps. Repeat. Whaaa…? She looked great, but I feel like she had a tutorial from the folks running the shoots at America’s Next Top Model before stepping out.

2. Speaking of the red carpet, did you notice that it was segregated? There was a line of velvet ropes all the way along the entry route, separating the stars from the non-famous rich folks and assorted hangers-on, looky-loos and party crashers. I know the organizers want to make sure the paparazzi has clear sightlines, but it seemed kind of weird. Like, “Okay, all the beautiful, popular kids go on this side, and the rest of you losers line up back there.”

3. New rule: no more montage sequences unless they’re 1) funny, or 2) under 45 seconds in length. Thank you.

4. Pssst, Catherine Keener. Perhaps the opening monologue at the Oscars isn’t really the best time to be text messaging. (Maybe she was just turning off her cell phone?) And I lost count of how many times the show’s director cut to shots of people in the audience looking REALLY bored. 15? 21? Too many.

5. Best ad-libbed line of the night goes to Jennifer Garner for her post-slip quip.

6. Best ad-libbed face of the night goes to Jake Gyllenhaal for his post-clunker sigh while presenting.

7. Isaac Mizrahi is only cute and funny for about 15 minutes… then he gets annoying and boring. He racked up too many uncomfortable silences during his red-carpet interviews to be entertaining. After a while, I was cringing. I miss Kathy Griffin like the deserts miss the rain.

8. Speaking of Isaac, I loved his clueless responses when Ludacris was telling him all about style icon Chris Bridges (Ludacris’ real name). “Oh, really? Okay, what’s he like?” Oh, Isaac.

9. Interpretive dance makes me sad. But who knew the song from Crash was sung by the actress who used to be on Aaron’s Way?? p.s. Kathleen “Bird” York? “Bird”? Seriously?

10. What was with the new policy of playing music under the winners for the entire duration of their acceptance speeches??? And shouldn’t dual winners *each* get 45 seconds to talk? I felt bad for the folks who went up in pairs, where the second winner stepped up to speak only to have the mic shut off and the music swell before a single syllable was uttered. That’s just not nice.

[Read the full list of 2005 Oscar Winners, plus our pre-award Picks and Predictions.]