The night was a triumph for Canadian science fiction Dune Denis Villeneuve and a return to form for a besieged show that struggles to rekindle relevance and fire, until the shocking moment between Smith and Rock left the audience in silent silence. The spectators in the house were puzzled and wondered how much of what they saw was true.
As Rock presented the award for best documentary, he threw a spontaneous joke at Smith’s wife, actress Jada Pinkett Smith, pointing to her and saying, “GI Jane 2, I look forward to seeing it.”
The joke was an apparent comparison between Pinkett Smith, who shaved her head late last year after a long battle with alopecia, and Demi Moore, who played candy in the 1997 film GI Jane.
Intentionally appearing on stage, Smith slapped Rock before returning to his seat. The live broadcast cut off the sound, while Smith shouted to Rock that he should, “Keep my wife’s name out of your mouth.”
Will Smith, right, caresses Oscar presenter Chris Rock after Rock talked about Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett Smith. Smith would later win the Academy Award for Best Actor. (Reuters)
Later, a tearful Smith took to the stage to receive the Best Actor Award for King Richard – a film about the life of Richard Williams, the father and coach of tennis stars Venus and Serena Williams. Smith struggled with an emotional speech as he apologized to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and spoke to learn to protect his family and colleagues.
“Art mimics life. I look like the crazy father, as they said about Richard Williams,” Smith said, laughing and applauding.
It was a strangely moving response to slapping Rock, something that had just happened a few minutes earlier, but the explosive moment – and the confused response to it – represented both the worst and the best outcome the organizers could have hoped for.
Trying to put aside seven years of bad luck – the show reported low ratings for each of these shows – the shocking encounter broke up a ceremony that began at a brisk pace, before ending after almost four hours of performance.
The organizers had tried a bit of everything to get the viewers back, alternating the ceremony with live and pre-recorded sketches, but it was the moment between Smith and Rock that caught the attention on social media. And while it’s darkening the seemingly happy theme of “Movie Lovers Unite,” the exchange clips garnered millions of views in a matter of minutes and made the entertainment world – once again – focus exclusively on the Oscars.
The academy had tried to achieve this by more traditional means. Venus and Serena started the show by presenting Beyoncé for her first appearance at the awards, as she sang Be Alive’s song nominated for King Richard alongside a yellow dance phalanx.
Singer and songwriter Beyoncé performs the song from the movie King Richard to open the 94th Oscars at the Dolby Theater. (Robyn Beck / AFP / Getty Images)
This was followed by the first live appearance of Encanto’s We Don’t Talk About Bruno and Billie Eilish’s Bond theme No Time To Die. And while Encanto won Best Animated Film, Eilish managed to win the musical for the best song that dominated the charts with this track.
Balancing the chaos, a series of positive stories unfolded overnight.
Veteran actor Troy Kotsur won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in CODA, becoming the second deaf actor to win an Oscar. He thanked both the academy and the “deaf theater scenes” that gave him room to improve his art, before thanking his father — who was also deaf but could not use sign language after becoming paralyzed in a car accident. accident— as an interpreter of his sign language he seemed to struggle through his own tears.
“I just wanted to say that this is dedicated to the deaf community, the CODA community and the disabled community,” Kotsur told an interpreter. “This is our moment.”
Troy Kotsour received the Best Supporting Actor award from Yoon Yoo-jung for his role in CODA, and became the first deaf person to win an Oscar for acting. (Photo by Neilson Barnard / Getty Images)
Ariana DeBose won the second female role award, one of the most controversial categories of this year’s awards. Her performance as Anita in the West Side Story adapted by Steven Spielberg put her over a tough cast, including Judi Dench in Belfast, Kirsten Dunst in The Power of the Dog, Jessie Buckley in The Lost Daughter and Aunjanue Ellis to King Richard.
In this way, he became the first Afro-Latina and openly LGBTQ + person to win in the category – a fact that he highlighted brilliantly in the speech of acceptance.
“To anyone who has ever questioned your identity,” he said, “I promise you there is a place for us.”
Jane Cambion won the Academy Award for Best Director for her work in The Power of the Dog, and became the first woman to be nominated for the award twice. It was previously for this category in 1994 for The Piano, for which it won Best Original Screenplay.
CLOCKS The Oscar race to stay up to date:
The Oscar race to stay up to date
The organizers of the 94th Academy Awards added a fan favorite award and withdrew eight award categories from the live ceremony, in a bid to reverse years of declining ratings. 2:25
Apart from individual victories, Dune left as the protagonist.
Before the show even started, it had won four awards, capturing the best production design (for Montreal’s Patrice Vermette) sound, editing and original music for Hans Zimmer – his first since 1994’s Lion King – in a series of categories were removed from the main events of the night.
The decision to cut these categories (part of a strategy to streamline and activate the show) was controversial, as insiders saw it as an insult to tech workers who walked away from the ceremonies. But the controversy turned out to be for the most part a no-brainer, as the winners’ speeches were incorporated in their entirety into the live broadcast.
Dune continued its reign in technical categories as Greig Fraser made his way to the cinema as soon as the live event began. It then surpassed some of the biggest films of the year – including Spider-Man, Shang-Chi and Free Guy, all of which were nominated only in this category – for visual effects.
The Best Sound award went to the crew who worked on Dune. (Neilson Barnard / Getty Images)
In addition to Vermette’s victory over Dune, Nova Scotia’s Ben Proudfoot kicked off the night in one of eight unreleased categories, winning his first Oscar for his short documentary The Queen of Basketball, following Luisa’s story (Lucy) Harris – a pioneer. in women’s basketball that scored the first basket in the history of Olympic women’s basketball and that died just two months ago. Last year, Proudfoot was nominated in the same category for A Concerto is a Conversation.
While The Power of the Dog and Belfast were both highly favored on the night, they managed to win only one award – Best Director and Best Original Screenplay, respectively. In fact, apart from Dune, CODA and The Eyes of Tammy Faye (which managed to get two houses), no film has won more than one award.
Just another overwhelming surprise on a night that had its overwhelming moments.
