The Oscars are Sunday. I won’t be watching.

I grew up in the San Fernando Valley. “Hollywood” was just 20 miles away. I grew up with and around people who were entrenched in making magic on film. Many of the kids I grew up with were connected with “the industry” and most were the people who really made the magic happen. People like writers, set builders, music composers, sound mixers, costume designers, and the like. They lived in Woodland Hills, not Beverly Hills. They were the people with talent.

And I grew up with actors, too. I don’t admire actors like the majority of Americans – because I saw them in real life. I don’t “dislike” actors; a famous actor was in my wedding party, but a lot of actors I’ve met have massive egos — like they invented a cure for cancer type of ego. The fact that actors receive a vastly overinflated paycheck, for something they generally had little part in making successful, seemed unfair.

Nonetheless, like millions of Americans, I’d faithfully tune in each year and watch Hollywood present its royalty. Twenty years ago, there were four nominated films for best picture. Now there are ten. The 150 percent increase in best picture nominees isn’t because films are so competitively outstanding that they needed six more slots. It’s because of money. In 2008, the most popular film (Dark Knight) was left off the list and people didn’t tune in. So, the solution was to expand the field. It worked like a shot of adrenaline into a dying body.

Oscars started to shift toward blatant political activism during the Bush years, encapsulated best by Michael Moore’s acceptance speech in which he blasted “W.” That sort of activism became even more common and frankly, expected. But that didn’t stop one of Hollywood’s luminaries from giving a child-rapist, a standing ovation. Meryl Streep stood and clapped loudly for Roman Polanski in 2003. Apparently, child rapists are okay, if they’re talented.

As Hollywood’s overt politics moved further left, ratings started to drift lower, and lower, but the lectures got worse. Although Streep had high praise for Polanski, she and others always felt at home bashing Trump. Leftist politics got warm hugs by the Academy and America tuned out.

The Oscar hosts got exceedingly unfunny. Films that no one watched were nominated for Oscars. And America continued to tune out. It might have been a combination of leftist political speeches, awful hosts, and god-awful films, but America lost its love for the Oscars. Ratings have completely tanked since 2014. I don’t know why 2014 briefly brought Oscar back to life. Maybe it was Ellen DeGeneres hosting. It wasn’t the film that won for “best picture.” That was Birdman. TV’s tuning in went from 41 million in 2010 to 9.85 million last year.

The 2022 hosts are Regina Hall, Amy Schumer, and Wanda Sykes. Schumer and Sykes are exceedingly unfunny. I have no idea why Hall will be on the stage. Sykes is gay and black, so the Academy already had those mandatory categories wrapped up. Maybe Hall is the straight-straight-man? Sorry, woman. Sorry. I am not a biologist; I don’t know if she is a woman.

In 2024, filmmakers must submit a dossier to the Academy, and that list will inform the Academy if the required alphabet soup of “underrepresented” races, genders, sexual orientation, and disability status persons (and maybe mix in some folks identifying as three-legged Dalmatians) are in the cast and crew. If the list doesn’t meet the “diversity and inclusion”  checklist, the film will not get an Oscar nod.

I think Oscar is on his last death rattle. I think Americans have had enough of being lectured to. They don’t want to spend hours watching a program where hosts make political statements, punctuated by awful jokes, intertwined with overpaid actors making more political speeches, and ending with the year’s “best picture” being a movie they likely never saw, never wanted to see, and likely will never see. I want to be entertained, and Oscar hasn’t entertained me in 25 years.

I don’t recognize half the movies nominated this year, but if one of the movies is about a gay, black dude who has sex with a swamp creature, it’s guaranteed to win.

The Oscars are Sunday. I Won’t Be Watching.

#OscarsSoDead