At least this broadcast is kept at two hours, and while Megan Mullally hosted, after her initial monologue we forget she was the host. She reappeared in a couple of segments which fell flat, and that was it for the very talented Will & Grace star. This year's Oscars telecast is unlikely to have a host, and that is just fine with me. Please, don't assume nature abhors a vacuum and fill the void with film clip montages. Thank you.
The 25th SAG Awards yielded some thoughts about the upcoming Oscars. The SAG awards are sometimes a decent barometer as to which way the Academy will lean in its acting categories. The Best Motion Picture Ensemble is supposed to be the Best Picture of the SAG Awards, but it tends to go to the movie with the largest cast. Black Panther won the Ensemble award, but don't count on it winning Best Picture.
* A Star Is Born's chances for Best Picture and any acting awards are dead in the water. The film netted four nominations, the most for any film this year, but came away empty-handed. Bradley Cooper again had to sit quietly and pretend to be happy that Rami Malek took home a Best Actor trophy instead of him. Lady Gaga is clearly not going to best Glenn Close, and Mahershala Ali is on too much of an awards season roll to be tripped up at the Oscars by Sam Elliott. Roma was not nominated for Best Ensemble, and A Star Is Born didn't even come away with that prize in Roma's absence.
* Rami Malek may be more of a serious Best Actor contender than I realized. I picked Christian Bale to win the Oscar for Best Actor and I stick by it, but Malek now has two major acting prizes. Did Malek suddenly seize Bale's momentum?
* Malek played Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody, but lip-synced the musical performances. Bradley Cooper played guitar and sang in A Star Is Born, and is now probably wondering aloud why he tried so hard after seeing Malek win again. Bohemian Rhapsody's success in awards season continues to baffle me. It plays more like a safe TV-movie of the week about Mercury than providing him with much life or insight. Cooper's performance was much more resonant, although neither actor was as memorable as Viggo Mortensen's Tony Lip in Green Book.
* The Best Supporting Female Actor award went to Emily Blunt for A Quiet Place, even though she was shut out of any Oscar nominations this year. Oscar front-runner Regina King was not nominated for a SAG Award oddly enough, and neither Amy Adams, Emma Stone, or Rachel Weisz, all up for the Oscar, benefited from King's absence with a trophy here. This solidifies my belief in King's eventual Oscar win.
* There is a lot of union business discussed in the acceptance speeches and the address by Screen Actor's Guild President Gabrielle Carteris. The audience at home relates to this union talk as much as they do when winners thank their teams and agents. A big thanks to Patricia Arquette for reminding actors to make copies of their call sheets so they can be paid right. Am I watching an employee union meeting at a factory or an awards show?
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