# Fires, frocks and the president who must not be named: my very weird night in the Oscars cheap seats

## Introduction
It’s the calm before the storm of the 97th Academy Awards and the announcer, Nick Offerman, is rehearsing his lines on the auditorium’s PA system. He introduces the nominees and trails the potential stories. He says: “Conclave won six awards tonight, including best picture,” and then pauses a moment to allow this momentous result to sink in. Upstairs at the Dolby theatre in Hollywood, the early arrivals have barely had time to get a drink in their hands. Now, all at once, they look stricken and cast nervous glances back and forth. Is Offerman joking, or has he just emitted white smoke by electing Edward Berger’s papal thriller? The Oscars don’t even start for another two hours and they worry they might already know how it ends.

 and , but the Oscars show must go on, for better or worse. For years, I reported on this event from afar, simultaneously loving it and hating it from my desk in London. But this felt like the right moment to view the gaudy circus up close, when its very existence hung in the balance briefly and at times the awards race threatened to veer into the ditch. Do the Oscars still matter? Should they have even happened at all? Where supporters see a beacon of hope, critics observe an unseemly bonfire of vanities.



Choreographed to perfection … Queen Latifah, pictured backstage, led dancers through a fevered tribute to Quincy Jones. Photograph: The Academy/Getty Images

“There have been some interesting pivots along the way,” admits Bill Kramer, the CEO of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, in what surely counts as a contender for this year’s “no shit, Sherlock” award. The contest delivered extended Squid Game carnage, with the early favourites hobbled or scuppered by self-inflicted controversies.

The  was Emilia Pérez, Jacques Audiard’s acclaimed crime-cartel musical, which sped off in pole position only to be totalled by a stash of inflammatory tweets by its star Karla Sofía Gascón, the first out transgender performer to be nominated for the best actress award. Gascón was yanked from promotional duties in the furore, airbrushed from the posters and effectively declared persona non grata.

But credit where it’s due: she hasn’t gone down without a fight. She rocks up at the Dolby like Sleeping Beauty’s bad fairy, smiling and defiant, here to gatecrash the christening. The applause she receives suggests that she is only partly forgiven.



‘Like Sleeping Beauty’s bad fairy’ … Karla Sofía Gascón at the Oscars. Photograph: Richard Harbaugh/AMPAS/AFP/Getty Images

Outside the Oscars bubble, the situation has been more perilous. January’s wildfires destroyed 18,000 homes, torched 23,000 hectares (57,000 acres) and prompted calls for this year’s event to be cancelled. It feels like “fiddling while Rome burns”, wrote the bestselling author Stephen King. You can see his point, except that fiddling – frivolity – is part of LA’s DNA. This is an industry town, its economy sustained by film production and tourism, with Oscars night serving as its centrepiece and barometer. The organisers, therefore, are keen to frame the event as a show of fortitude and resistance. Ideally, its presence proves healing, too.



‘A benign, smiling shark’ … Jeff Goldblum, as captured by Xan.

If the fires have been doused, but their effects are there for all to see. “There is a sense of trauma here,” the Australian animator Adam Elliot says. “But people are saying hello to one another on the street, which is something I’ve never noticed before. One of the cab drivers was telling me: ‘Everyone is a little bit kinder to each other at the moment.’”

Officially speaking, Elliot is one of the night’s main players, Oscar-nominated for his spiky stop-motion feature , but the man remains low-profile enough to wander the Dolby theatre unhindered. Instead, the big splash is caused by the arrival of Jeff Goldblum. He cuts through the crowds like a benign, smiling shark.

Viewed at close quarters, the Oscars is simultaneously more glamorous and more humdrum than it appears on TV, rather like an annual works do with prettier faces and better dresses. As with most works dos, it’s a gently hierarchical affair, with the stars steered in one direction and the hoi polloi in another. The staff are helpful and welcoming; the event feels inclusive. But the mechanics exist to remind everyone of their place in the great scheme of things. In my case, it’s up on mezzanine two.



Life imitating art … Mikey Madison edged out The Substance’s Demi Moore to win best actress. Photograph: Anthony Harvey/Rex/Shutterstock

It’s no secret that the film industry skews left. Jon Stewart once joked that the Oscars was the only place where you could mingle with famous stars without first making a donation to the Democratic party. This year’s awards, crucially, take place against the wider metaphorical bonfire of American politics. It’s only days since Trump’s and JD Vance’s . The western world may have fractured. Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency is running amok. The conditions are perfect for a full-throated protest Oscars, a fiery demonstration of artistic resistance. All O’Brien has to do is light the touch paper.

In the event,  and Anora lead the field.



Golden boy … Anora’s Sean Baker is the first person to win four individual gongs since Walt Disney in 1954. Photograph: Al Seib/AMPAS/Rex/Shutterstock

As for the show, it has been convivial, smooth-running and not at all brutal. In an average year, that might almost count as a black mark against it. But the stakes were too high, the noises-off too alarming and the organisers determined not to spin any more drama out of crises. The Academy bosses longed for a safe, friendly Oscars: a reassuring hat-tip to LA and to those who live and work in the city. I suspect that it played out exactly as they wished.

## Additional Notes
Immediately after the ceremony wraps, the guests are herded upstairs to the Governors Ball. I am informed that this is a highly exclusive affair, for the creme de la creme – and no doubt it is, but the place is thronged and you have to move edgewise. I pause for a few minutes to chat with the producers of No Other Land and say a fly-by hello to The Brutalist’s director, . By this point of the night, everyone seems to be in the grip of hunger and exhaustion; the food trays are emptied the instant they appear. In pursuing an elusive platter of vol-au-vents across the dancefloor, I almost mow down , the star of Wicked. Fortunately, she is perfectly gracious about it.

From outside the ballroom comes the faint sound of machinery. On the red carpet, the construction crews are already at work, manoeuvring cranes and forklifts to dismantle the lighting rigs. This is probably how the circus wraps up every year, with its behind-the-scenes workers putting everything back in boxes; as much a part of Oscars tradition as the victory speeches and the dance routines. The party is over and the work continues. It’s time to make like Quincy Jones and ease on down the road.
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