How the Oscars can ‘get it right’ this year

Entertainment writers love trashing the Academy Awards.

“They snubbed this person or that movie!”

“They never pick the actual Best Picture!”

Outside of the industry and the opinionated film nerds on social networks, it seems like very few people care about the Oscars at all. Television ratings for the telecast continue to trend down, and the political rifts in the country have turned even the most popular movies into ammunition for cultural warfare.

For the first time in years, the upcoming telecast will at least be centered on a pair of legitimate box office juggernauts in “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer.” If those two movies can’t get people to care about the Oscars like before (think as recently as Titanic” in 1997, or “The Lord of the Rings” in the early 2000s), then the Academy Awards might as well start acting like the Golden Globes and serve copious amounts of alcohol to all the nominees.

As a movie fan and avid Oscar viewer, I want the Academy Awards to hold at least some esteem in popular culture. For all the mistakes they continue to make, the Academy at least tries to make the right decisions. Case in point: They finally awarded Samuel L. Jackson an Oscar, almost 30 years after should’ve won one for “Pulp Fiction.” (Counterpoint: The Academy foolishly kicked his Lifetime Achievement honor to a non-televised ceremony).

So, putting aside my own personal feelings about this year’s lineup of contenders, I’ve concocted my strategy for the least controversial Oscar telecast. No. 1: We don’t want anybody getting slapped!

Find a way to award BOTH “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” with top prizes, but don’t make it an “Oppie Sweep.”

Look, “Barbenheimer” will outlive whatever the outcome of this year’s Academy Awards. In the end, they both made so much money, it’s hard to feel bad about whether they earn the proper amount of critical recognition.

“Oppenheimer,” at this current juncture, remains the heavy favorite to win several categories, including Best Picture and Best Director. The film would be a worthy Best Picture winner, and Nolan, one of Hollywood’s most popular filmmakers, also deserves a Best Director trophy for his mantle.

When the Academy truly loves a movie, however, they tend to get carried away. Even last year, “Everything Everywhere All At Once” wound up winning categories it probably didn’t need. The directors won in BOTH directing and screenwriting, and, as much as everyone loves Jamie Lee Curtis, that Supporting Actress performance wasn’t even the best supporting actress performance from that movie.

The Academy weathered some major criticism for snubbing “Barbie” in two key categories: Margot Robbie for Best Actress and Greta Gerwig for Best Director (both were nominated in other categories). Bestowing the Oscar to Gerwig and co-writer Noah Baumbach in the Adapted Screenplay category, combined with wins in categories like Original Song and Costumes, would appropriately spotlight the other key half of “Barbenheimer” while celebrating the best aspects of “Barbie’s” success. The only key creative left out of the party would then be Robbie, but, hey, something tells me she’ll be back in the Oscar fold sometime soon.

Lily Gladstone needs to win Best Actress, even if some don’t consider it a “lead” performance.

Personally, I see Gladstone as the center of Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon.” Her absence in the second half of the movie is glaring but not without intention. While not as showy of a performance as others in the category, Gladstone is also doing the kind of exceptional work that doesn’t always get noticed by the Academy.

Gladstone winning would make history, and some see that as the sole motivating factor. Funny thing is, for all the criticism Hollywood gets for virtue signaling, even their most recent history is checkered with as many “old guard” wins as it does celebrations of diversity.

Gladstone deserves it AND would make history. That’s a good deal. Yes, Emma Stone was incredible in “Poor Things.” She won an Oscar recently (admittedly for a “lesser” performance from “La La Land,” but still). She’s got clout in the industry and many more years to win a second Oscar and beyond.

“Career” wins everyone will celebrate.

The Oscars love to give “makeup” Oscars to performers after failing to recognize their earlier, better work. Think Al Pacino in “Scent of a Woman” or as recently as a couple years ago with Jessica Chastain and “The Eyes of Tammy Faye.” The phenomenon has an unfortunate stacking effect. For example, the Samuel L. Jackson likely lost for “Pulp Fiction” because the Academy took way too long to recognize Martin Landeau (winning for “Ed Wood”).

Sometimes, the “career” prize comes too loaded with the baggage of a bad movie. As much as I love Brendan Frasier, “The Whale” is an egregiously bad film, and it shouldn’t be associated with any kind of Oscar victory.

Fortunately, two of this year’s “overdue” contenders are providing career-best work in good movies: Robert Downey Jr. in Supporting Actor for “Oppenheimer,” and Paul Giamatti in Actor for “The Holdovers.” Downey is a virtual lock at this point to win, but Giamatti faces stiff competition from “Oppenheimer” star Cillian Murphy. One could argue Murphy is overdue too, but being the face of the ultimate Best Picture winner will be a solid consolation prize. Both Nolan and Downey will praise the heck out of Murphy during their speeches.

Don’t get cute with the “surprise” wins.

Nobody knows how to correctly predict the outcome of the short film categories. This year, however, the Academy needs to use the Live Action Short category to award another long-overdue nominee. Wes Anderson, arguably the most distinguishable filmmaker among his peers, is in contention for the Netflix short, “The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar.” The Academy has repeatedly whiffed on finding some gold for Anderson, and, short of the massive nominations load for “The Grand Budapest Hotel,” the Academy routinely underestimates his craft. He deserves to win for a “bigger” category like Picture, Directing or Screenwriting, but Live Action Short will more than suffice.

Assuming the Academy doesn’t screw this one up, the next step is finding a short film subject for Paul Thomas Anderson to direct next year.

More places to avoid surprises:

• The Best Picture nominee “The Zone of Interest” needs to win in the International Feature category. It seems obvious, but the Academy occasionally screws this sort of thing up (see the nomination load for “Pan’s Labyrinth”).

• We all want Ryan Gosling to perform “I’m Just Ken” on the telecast. It’s a fun song, but it’s NOT a better song than “What Was I Made For?”

• Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know “The Boy and the Heron” is a masterpiece, but for the sake of the audience, “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-verse” should win Best Animated Feature. “Spider-verse” is just as good as “Heron,” and, it’s one of only about 12 movies that made decent money at the box office. We’re trying to keep the lights on at the Academy, OK?

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Tyler Wilson can be reached at twilson@cdapress.com.