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Op-Ed by Quendrith Johnson, Los Angeles Correspondent
You couldn’t make up the backstory to the 98th Oscars, the black cloud of the Reiner murders with a night-before party at comedian Conan O’Brien’s house where Rob and Michelle Reiner’s now-jailed son had a run-in, then the actual Ides of March (March 15) show date, complete with Conan O’Brien kept on as host for “the biggest night for Hollywood.” Many insiders were surprised no change was made as far as the host, but an emotionally beleaguered Conan O’Brien kept it mostly civil as emcee for the Sunday night telecast on ABC, also featured on streamer Hulu.
Baked into this star-crossed set of circumstances you had the recent passing of beloved comic talent Catherine O’Hara, and before her icon Diane Keaton, both of whom completed a trio of legendary deaths that included Robert Redford. The tribute to the Reiners rightly landed on elder statesman of Hollywood and most favored host of all time, Billy Crystal. Crystal perhaps should have taken control of the entire evening?
Meanwhile, the tribute to Redford resulted in a post-show quibble between two great dames of Hollywood, Barbra Streisand and Jane Fonda. Caught on the red carpet by The Guardian UK, Fonda noted she starred in four films with the late Sundance founder, while Streisand who tuned up her pipes for the occasion, was on board for the only film in which she starred with Redford, “The Way We Were.” Fonda probably should have been tapped for the tribute. Hollywood hindsight isn’t 20/20?
With a record 16 Oscar nominations, Ryan Coogler’s “Sinners” had to settle for four or 25% of its noms. Best Actor for Michael B. Jordan, Best Original Screenplay, Best Cinematography, and Best Original Score; then Coogler and company got to watch the rest of the big awards slide to insider favorite OBAA, or “One Battle After Another.” Apart from “Hamnet” darling, Jessie Buckley, taking the Best Actress gong in a historic win for Ireland in a country first.
If you spent anytime in this Town, you knew OBAA was the shoo-in favorite, for obvious reasons. And its director PTA, or Paul Thomas Anderson would not be denied. Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, all for PTA, Best Supporting Actor for Sean Penn, Best Film Editing, and Best Casting. Maya Rudolph’s husband PTA topped a who’s who of directors, while Penn bested a stacked field of supporting actors, including Benicio Del Toro in OBAA, Jacob Elordi in “Frankenstein,” Delroy Lindo for “Sinners,” and Stellan Skarsgård’s “Sentimental Value” performance. Yes, you heard that right, Best Supporting Actor for Sean Penn?
It was like old home week, with another Best Supporting win for Actress, Amy Madigan in “Weapons.” She’s also a veteran actor deserving of wins, also wife of famed actor insider Ed Harris. Yet much like Sean Penn’s win, look who was in the field of noms; a lot of younger talent with breakthrough performances in 2025. Teyana Taylor and Wunmi Mosaku both for “Sinners,” for example, but also Elle Fanning and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas both for “Sentimental Value.” How does a Best Supporting Actress category get a double stack on two movies, you may wonder?
Despite losing in two major categories (Best Actress to Buckley for “Hamnet” and Best Supporting Actress to Madigan in “Weapons”) and not performing as a box office banger, OBAA won more Oscars at a count of six than any other film. For the record, its domestic gross is $70 M USD on $130 MUSD production costs as of this week, according to The Numbers website. So how did this little-seen, auteur-driven movie win the majority of top gongs?
Was it because of its ‘message’ from the Thomas Pynchon novel Vineland (1990), adapted as allegorical to the ICE climate of perceived oppression and left vs right political underpinnings; the very through-line of which breaks the 1940s Golden Age of Hollywood rule. Attributed to Samuel Goldwyn, the rule is: “If you want to send a message, use Western Union.” Is OBAA ‘more message than movie’ as some have claimed, you decide?
Then there’s second-generation Spanish National Treasure acting sensation Javier Bardem who stood firm as presenter, wearing an anti-war “pin” on his black-tie jacket, knowing full well the Oscars have strict rules in place since the Susan Sarandon-Tim Robbins speech-as-protest days. But this was a protest badge dusted off from Bardem’s opposition to the war in Afghanistan, he said, as if recycling a conflict message makes it somehow less controversial; a staunch and heartfelt anti-war message… pinned onto a tuxedo, imagine that contradiction for some?
Since DeadlineHollywood Founder Nikki Finke’s death on Oct. 9, 2022, we’ve gone four years without a gadfly on the state of entertainment and specifically award shows. Finke, love her or hate her, used to “live snark” the major shows to call out the contradictions in “Tinseltown.” Though she would never be caught dead referring to “H’wood” with that moniker, the fraught relationship with the studios and stars, all pros above and below the line, resulted in checks and balances on the system. Finke blasted “TPTB” or The Powers That Be in Hollywood often for good reason, and once this resulted in her Oscar credentials being pulled. But Nikki Finke stood up for fans and insiders who questioned a lot of the decisions made in Town.
Now there’s no brakes on the “clown car” that some refer to as Hollywood. Nikki isn’t even here to vent about the once storied stand-alone studio Warner Bros. now gone to the highest bidder, to be subsumed into the Paramount Skydance ecosystem. Meaning there’s no one to shine a spotlight on controversial sales like WBD, or insider changes that may need to be made in Town, nor anyone to point out glaring faux pas that could be avoided in so far as the Oscars presentation is concerned.
What will we remember from the 98th Oscars: Timothée Chalamet’s Reality TV love-interest plus-one Kylie Jenner, Teyana Taylor’s Oscar crowd shove issue, or Gwyneth Paltrow’s “side-butt” reveal dress? These are literally the most reported stories in the aftermath of a hushed ceremony under an inconceivable dark cloud on the Ides of March in wartime America. We hope the answer to this question isn’t “Yes,” but it might be… that or the Reiners Murder cloud?
By 2029, the Oscars will be streamed on YouTube. That will be the 101st Oscars, if you’re counting… but will Hollywood still be here; will movie stars still be here, not AI talent or licensed versions of said movie stars, but more importantly, will there be an audience who cares?
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