Predictions Friday: How the Oscars Can Avoid an Emmys-Style Ratings Wipe-out

It isn’t exactly a secret that awards shows have become mostly unwatchable for a sizable majority of this country. It isn’t just as simple as “Hollywood went ‘woke’ ” (they did). Or “there is too much competing content” (there is). Or “what content there is remains out of touch for the common person” (it is). Or we’re moving through a major crossroads / turning point (we are), and our country, and our world, is dividing between the very, very online and the very, very offline (without a doubt). It isn’t just one of these factors hurting ratings — it’s all of them all at once.

These external forces are mostly beyond our control. We can’t suddenly make HBO’s shows less compelling or Oscar voters less sophisticated in their tastes. We can’t take back how the internet and especially social media have changed our world. We can’t suddenly make the Zoomers interested in what we’re interested in, like movies in movie theaters. We can’t go back. We can only adapt or die.

There is one thing we can do. It’s also what both the Oscars and the Emmys can do as well as most production company executives: bring back the truth. It seems too abstract, but it’s very simple. We’re all engaged in a kind of ongoing episode of the Emperor’s New Clothes. The Emperor in this case would be how we see ourselves as a community, how Hollywood sees itself, and what image they want to project to their audiences. More and more, the audiences are thinking, “The Emperor isn’t wearing any clothes. Why are they pretending that he is?”

How we got here is a much longer conversation. I would recommend reading The New Puritans by Andrew Doyle for a very in-depth, brilliantly written thesis on the issues. To simplify, a small cabal of very loud, very strident, very influential people has Hollywood by the balls. As Teddy Roosevelt once said, later repeated by G. Gordon Liddy, “When you have them by the balls, the hearts and minds soon follow.” Hollywood is at the mercy of those who can most easily embarrass them.

This is how it goes: someone is offended by something and says so on Twitter. Because more people are connected than ever before in human history at a time when there ARE more people than ever before that means a tweet that triggers an emotion is likely to spread quickly, intensifying as it goes from tweeter to tweeter until full blown mass hysteria is reached. At that point, very high-status blue-check types then compose lengthy, agonizing, ball-cringingly sanctimonious think pieces that they then drop back onto Twitter for maximum engagement, shares, RTs, etc. People wear that headline proudly, a shimmering symbol of virtue in a sea of immorality and thought criminals.

I have done it many times myself. I’m as guilty as anyone in bringing us to this point, which is nothing less than potentially the death of movies in theaters and the Oscars. Let’s not go there just yet. People like me have to try harder to stop the madness before it’s too late.

But essentially, no awards show or movie or article in any newspaper is safe from the scrutinizing eyes of the new puritans. They are always on the watch for rule breakers. To once again reference Freddie DeBoer’s Planet of Cops:

The woke world is a world of snitches, informants, rats. Go to any space concerned with social justice and what will you find? Endless surveillance. Everybody is to be judged. Everyone is under suspicion. Everything you say is to be scoured, picked over, analyzed for any possible offense. Everyone’s a detective in the Division of Problematics, and they walk the beat 24/7. You search and search for someone Bad doing Bad Things, finding ways to indict writers and artists and ordinary people for something, anything. That movie that got popular? Give me a few hours and 800 words. I’ll get you your indictments. That’s what liberalism is, now — the search for baddies doing bad things, like little offense archaeologists, digging deeper and deeper to find out who’s Good and who’s Bad. I wonder why people run away from establishment progressivism in droves.

This isn’t something Hollywood can survive. It isn’t something art can survive. It isn’t something the Oscars or any awards show can survive. Unfortunately, to survive this moment requires someone to have an adaptation to survive the worst ridicule, public humiliation, and abuse — you know, like He Who Must Not Be Named (but he who is uniquely adapted to survive this moment in American history).

I myself am rather Teflon to it. Verbal and physical abuse was my comfort zone as a kid which is what makes it somewhat easier for me to survive the nonstop attacks I receive every day online. People always say to me, “I don’t know how you do it.” But honestly, I can survive it because I already survived worse. In some sense, I don’t know anything other than that. I grew up trusting almost no one, and that has served me well as someone who can’t shut up.

That is what people will have to learn how to do if they want to survive this moment. My solutions are always the same solutions. Readers of this site know that I am a broken record. I KNOW it all comes from a good place but believe me when I tell you — the current course we’re on is not survivable. There is a reason why Succession and The White Lotus did so well at the Emmys. They are safe harbors for great writing. Why? Because they allow viewers to comfortably criticize the characters because they are rich and white. That makes them safe targets. Both shows are so well written that they offer up even non-white characters who are complex, as opposed to how they usually must appear in every TV show or movie — like noble saviors to the broken white characters.

But it isn’t just the ‘woke’ stuff – it’s also the blue state, red state stuff. Comedians aren’t funny anymore because their safe targets have narrowed to such a significant degree they can’t make fun of the people who need to be made fun of: the uptight, puritanical, hypocritical, sanctimonious Left. The White Lotus is great for this reason. Mike White calls them out.

Does this mean people will tune into the Emmys because The White Lotus is a great show? Of course not. Hollywood has now burned most of its bridges with the general public by now – even those who agree with them politically. They’re just exhausted by having to always be on guard and on watch for any potential thought crime. Why would audiences sign up for that? To watch what amounts to a hostage video of very frightened people who have no choice but to constantly signal how good they are, how responsible they are, how careful they are. Nah, man. It’s boring.

The bottom line is this: if you want people to watch the show you have to send a signal that you no longer care about being wished into the Cornfield.

Your show can’t be just aimed at rich blue state people. I would definitely say it’s time to beg Ricky Gervais to host the Oscars. He would have to be given free rein to do it, but so what? Do you want to save the show or do you want to watch the show collapse with a ratings wipe-out?

https://youtu.be/sR6UeVptzRg

Audiences will tune in if they know the host will insult the right targets –aka Hollywood. They want to see someone throw tomatoes at Hollywood. That is the only reason they would tune in. They’re sick of sanctimony and hypocrisy, I’m sorry to say. The people Twitter would throw a fit about if they were hired as a host are exactly the people who should host. This is simply the fact of the matter. I do not think the Oscars will do that. I think they will play it safe and I think they will eke out a decent ratings dip from last year.

Then again, the Oscar slap brought more attention to the Oscars than we’ve seen in 20 years so people might tune in just to see how the Oscars deals with that. But mushy gushy stuff like we saw at the Emmys, they’ll turn it off after five minutes.

But maybe they don’t care anymore about ratings. Maybe they figure that network TV or live shows are dead. Let’s just stick a fork in it. As they head into their 100th year, the Oscars can move off of ABC and onto streaming and live out their days as virtuous, knowing they are now closer to God like the Catholics before the Reformation. Maybe that is what they want their last moment to be like. Maybe having high ratings or relevance beyond the tiny circle of industry elites isn’t the goal. Who knows? But if they want the big ratings, get someone like Gervais and learn to live with the consequences.

With all of that said… onto predictions.

Clayton Davis has his updated predictions over at Variety and for Best Picture, in alpha order, he has:

“Avatar: The Way of Water” (20th Century Studios)
James Cameron, Jon Landau
“The Banshees of Inisherin” (Searchlight Pictures)
Graham Broadbent, Peter Czernin, Martin McDonagh
“Elvis” (Warner Bros.)
Baz Luhrmann, Gail Berman, Catherine Martin, Patrick McCormick, Schuyler Weiss
“Empire of Light” (Searchlight Pictures)
Pippa Harris, Sam Mendes
“Everything Everywhere All at Once” (A24)
Dan Kwan, Mike Larocca, Anthony Russo, Joe Russo, Daniel Scheinert, Jonathan Wang
“The Fabelmans” (Universal Pictures) ***
Tony Kushner, Kristie Macosko Krieger, Steven Spielberg
“The Son” (Sony Pictures Classics)
Iain Canning, Joanna Laurie, Emile Sherman, Christophe Spadone, Florian Zeller
“TÁR” (Focus Features)
Todd Field, Scott Lambert, Alexandra Milchan
“Top Gun: Maverick” (Paramount Pictures)
Jerry Bruckheimer, Tom Cruise, Christopher McQuarrie, David Ellison
“Women Talking” (MGM/United Artists Releasing)
Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner, Frances McDormand, Brad Pitt

These look pretty good to me. I am not going to complain if both Top Gun and Avatar get on there. That is all we really need for the Oscars to have one foot back in the real world. To not have the Movie of the Year on the Best Picture list would be malpractice by the Academy, no matter what anyone thinks. The Movie of the Year should always be on their list by default. It never is but it should be.

I think She Said is going to be a major player sight unseen. I think this because it has the best “Oscar Story.”

Top Gun Maverick – Top Gun is literally the wood panel that saves Kate Winslet in Titanic. Without Top Gun, imagine what this year would look like at the box office. Top Gun is Ricky Gervais hosting the Oscars. It is the deus ex machina for 2023.

Babylon – Damien Chazelle narrowly missed Best Picture in 2016 when La La Land lost to Moonlight. Now he’s back with a big, beautiful epic. I could see it turning into quite the Oscar story.

The Fablemans – Has there ever been anyone as brilliant or prolific as Spielberg? This is his origin story. He’s won Best Director twice and Best Picture once. If he wins a third time, then he will be on a very exclusive list. John Ford is still the champ with four wins. Then (my hero) Frank Capra and William Wyler with three. Spielberg would join that esteemed list. All that stands in his way would be the New Puritans who have dictated no white man, especially no American white man, can win in the category. Spielberg is just gracious enough not to mind.

TÁR – Hollywood loves a comeback story. Todd Field took years to come back with a film and for it to be this film is truly a major achievement. My guess is that the critics will defy the “Ordnung” and award him with the most wins for Best Director when they start to drop their awards.

Women Talking — Sarah Polley is an Oscar story. She finally lives up to the promise of her early career. She’s been at this a long time, making short films, honing her craft, and here she shows she can make large canvas films as good as the best of them.

She Said – Hollywood must reckon, at some point, with Harvey Weinstein. This film is directed by, written by, and led by women. What better way to do that than to hand over the top prizes to them? That is, to my mind, the most compelling of the Oscar stories at the moment.

Avatar: The Way of Water — Jim Cameron is another titan, like Spielberg, who has won only once despite having two of the highest-grossing films of all time that are originals: Titanic and then Avatar. He also lost to Kathryn Bigelow in 2009, which kind of makes him overdue. The movie will have to deliver and make a whole bunch of money. We all assume it will. Can he top himself from the first one?

Everything Everywhere All At Once — The only film that has really awakened the Zoomers with something they actively wanted to see (other than horror, fantasy, or superhero). It feels very new and kind of revolutionary in how it rethinks reality and cinema. It might not be exactly fun to watch (for some of us old timers), but it is hard not to be impressed by it.

Till — This would not have been on my radar with an “Oscar Story” until I saw the featurette. Now I see that it is going to be more than a really depressing movie about a terrible tragedy in our shameful past but rather something more optimistic and forward-thinking. I imagine that could be very moving for voters and potentially propel it into the conversation.

Otherwise, films will land in the Best Picture race more because of one element like a lead performance (Austin Butler in Elvis, maybe Hugh Jackman in The Son, Olivia Colman in Empire of Light).

Just for fun, I went back to my predictions from last year to see how accurate they were – dated 9/17/21:

Belfast
King Richard
The Power of the Dog
Nightmare Alley
West Side Story
House of Gucci
Licorice Pizza
Dune
CODA
Don’t Look Up or Tragedy of Macbeth

Okay so I got pretty close, shockingly. It’s honestly hard to even remember what was nominated even last year, isn’t it? But somehow I got it mostly right, months in advance. I only missed one and that was Drive My Car (because I still can’t believe it got in).

This was before the PGA and the Globes and everything else, so that isn’t a bad target. Let’s see if we can match it this time around. This year feels more unpredictable.

At any rate, here would be my predictions as of now:

Avatar: The Way of Water
Babylon
Elvis
The Banshees of Inisherin
Empire of Light
Everything Everywhere All at Once
The Fabelmans
Glass Onion
She Said
TÁR

My alts at the moment, would be: Till, Armageddon Time, Top Gun: Maverick, The Son, Women Talking, Wakanda Forever, The Woman King, White Noise

Best Director
Damien Chazelle, Babylon
Steven Spielberg, Fabelmans
Jim Cameron, Avatar
Todd Field, TÁR
The Daniels, Everything Everywhere

Alts would be: Maria Schrader, She Said; Sarah Polley, Women Talking; Rian Johnson, Glass Onion; Baz Luhrmann, Elvis; Chinonye Chukwu, TILL

Best Actress
Michelle Yeoh, Everything, Everywhere
Margot Robbie, Babylon
Cate Blanchett, TÁR
Olivia Colman, Empire of Light
Viola Davis, The Woman King

Alts would be: Carey Mulligan, She Said; Naomi Ackie, I Wanna Dance With Somebody; Danielle Deadwyler, Till

Best Actor
Austin Butler, Elvis
Brendan Fraser, The Whale
Diego Calva, Babylon
Colin Farrell, The Banshees of Inisherin
Hugh Jackman, The Son

Supporting Actress
Michelle Williams, The Fabelmans
Jamie Lee Curtis, Everything Everywhere
Janelle Monáe, Glass Onion
Jessie Buckley, Women Talking
Rooney Mara, Women Talking (unless lead)
Alts: Claire Foy, Women Talking; Laura Dern, The Son

Supporting Actor
Judd Hirsch, The Fabelmans
Brendan Gleeson, Banshees of Inisherin
Brad Pitt, Babylon
Jeremy Strong, Armageddon Time
Anthony Hopkins, Armageddon Time
Alts: Tom Hanks, Elvis; Jaylin Webb, Armageddon Time

Original Screenplay
The Fabelmans
Empire of Light
TÁR
Babylon
The Banshees of Inisherin
Alts: Armageddon Time; Everything, Everywhere; TILL

Adapted Screenplay
Women Talking
She Said
The Son
White Noise
Top Gun: Maverick

We can wait on the rest of the categories for now.  Enjoy your weekend.