Oscar the Grouch

 In Hollywood, money is not accepted. Dreams are the currency of this fairyland, where glancing references to the global recession that is dragging the world down from yet another deflating speculation bubble are just that—glances out the window of Dorothy's cottage at the wondrous world outside. At the 81st Academy Awards, the Academy sometimes caught a glimpse of the approaching tornado out of the corner of its eye, and it quickly turned away.

 Like its corporate sponsors, the Academy probably would have liked to appeared defiant in the face of economic decline; declaring, with a grandiose gesture from the ivory tower of art, that the show must go on. Like its sponsors, the Academy Awards alluded to the global economic crisis just enough to irritate, but not enough to serve a purpose.  

 Everyone had a style; Coca-Cola deflected attention by pimping their latest humanitarian cause du jour, Sprint blithely ignored everything like a teenager texting on her new 3G phone, and Hyundai injected oddball phrases like “these troubling times” into the plot of their mediocre car pornography, leaving those vague spectres to hang, creaking in the doorway. Foreign companies like Hyundai and Honda ran commercials with an unprecedented dose of America-centrism—which is appropriate, since this is all America's fault.

 For its part, the Academy occupied itself with the usual fashionable autofellatio that “People” will fawn over for the next year and a half. Academy president Sid Ganis made no speech, rendering the hallowed institution a silent irrelevance at its own show. Instead, the forum was left open to presenters and award-winners to send whatever messages they pleased.

 Though it was rarely genuine and never uncensored, this was the most interesting part. What comes through—both overtly and subtextually—in the acceptance speeches and category introductions acts as a measure of our social climate. From Sean Penn and Dustin Lance Black's tearful rallying cries for equal rights for homosexuals, to Tina Fey saying “a blinking cursor on a blank screen” instead of pen on paper, the concerns and considerations of the outside world were sucked into a swirling microcosm, condensed, and spit back out onto televisions across the world. Except much wealthier and prettier.

 Social commentary and fashion guidance is the only reason to watch the Oscars anymore. At least it is acknowledged that the dress that one starlet wears on one night is just as important as the culmination of years of planning and hopes and dreams and work—movies, that is. All is well, really—people tend to know much more about what movies they like than what clothes to wear. It's an instinctual reaction, and there's no reason to trust an arbitrary construct like the Academy with our taste in movies.

 So the Oscars is about everything but the movies now. The video game industry shut down and reformulated its seminal event when it stopped being about the games. Should the Academy do the same? It isn't really up to the Academy—it's up to the viewers at home. There were already viewership fears this year, which means a well placed blow in a years time could bring the house of cards toppling down.

 Perhaps our flaccid attempts at controlling our rampant energy overuse could be applied with some effectiveness to the Oscars—always watch the Oscars in as large a group as possible to minimize energy usage and ratings, and turn off the Oscars on unnecessary televisions—especially when no one is in the room. Or, just don't watch them at all.