Oscars recap: The good, the bad and the John Travolta

Last month, movie fans accused the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences of baked-in racism when it failed to give even one of the 20 Oscar acting nominations to a non-white performer and, further, awarded the Martin Luther King Jr. biopic a mere two nominations.

But on Sunday night, in addition to making up with Selma as best it could in the circumstances, the Oscar telecast seemed eager to ensure no marginal group was left behind. Which may be why most of the energy during the lacklustre telecast came from a parade of winners trooping to the microphone to pay tribute to the continuing struggles of: African-Americans; women advocating for equal pay; gay individuals; downtrodden Mexicans; and those suffering in silence from crippling diseases.

Still, while the inspiring speeches repeatedly brought people to their feet – which likely made liberal Hollywood feel good about itself again – viewers still found reason to complain after an apparently inappropriate comment from one Hollywood veteran, and creepy behaviour by another.

Herewith, some Oscar high- and low-lights.

Neil Patrick Harris, an awards show veteran with a few Broadway musicals to his credit, opened the telecast with a heartfelt song-and-dance tribute to the magic of the movies. But just as the number threatened to tip over into treacle, comedian Jack Black interrupted Harris with a manic tirade about the pointlessness of celebrating art in a crass, commercial town like Hollywood. “Our industry’s in flux, it’s run by mucky-mucks pitching tents for tentpoles and chasing Chinese bucks,” Black sang. “Opening with lots of zeros, all we get are superheroes: Spider-Man, Superman, Batman, Jedi Man, Sequel Man, Prequel Man, formulaic scripts! And after Fifty Shades of Grey they’ll all have leather whips!”

As he built to a rabid finale, Black yelped: “The only screens we’ll watch them on are the screens in our jeans. Screens in our jeans! Screens in our jeans! The only screens we’ll watch them on are the screens in our jeans!”

After last year’s Sony hack leaked emails revealing that female stars of the Oscar-nominated American Hustle were paid less than their male counterparts, the issue has been a hot subject in Hollywood. Still, when Best Supporting Actress winner Patricia Arquette (Boyhood) concluded her acceptance speech by declaring: “It’s our time to have wage equality once and for all, and equal rights for women in the United States of America,” the moment came as such a surprised that Meryl Streep and Jennifer Lopez began hooting and hollering from their front-row seats at the Dolby Theatre.

John Legend and the rapper Common delivered a stirring rendition of Glory, the theme song from Selma, accompanied by dozens of extras re-enacting Martin Luther King Jr.’s freedom march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama. The performance brought the audience to their feet – and tears to the eyes of some, including star David Oyelowo, who played Dr. King.

Moments later, after the tune was named Best Original Song, Legend spoke about the film’s contemporary relevance.

“We wrote this song for a film that was based on events that were 50 years ago, but we say Selma is now, because the struggle for justice is right now. We know that the Voting Rights Act that they fought for 50 years ago is being compromised right now in this country today,” he said. “We live in the most incarcerated country in the world. There are more black men under correctional control today than were under slavery in 1850. When people are marching with our song, we want to tell you that we are with you, we see you, we love you, and march on.”

Snagging the award for Best Adapted Screenplay, writer Graham Moore (The Imitation Game) told the audience that he had tried to kill himself at age 16, “because I felt weird and I felt different and I felt like I did not belong.” He explained: “I would like this moment to be for that kid out there who feels like she’s weird or she’s different or she doesn’t fit in anywhere. Yes, you do. I promise you do. Stay weird. Stay different, and then when it’s your turn and you are standing on this stage, please pass this same message to the next person who comes along.”

About two-thirds of the way through, we realized what this year’s Oscars had been missing: real acidic wit. We don’t necessarily want Neil Patrick Harris to be Chris Rock (who was deemed too nasty after he dismissed a number of actors as lightweights during his 2005 Oscars hosting gig) but we know he’s capable of a much tastier, sharper bite than he displayed. So our ears perked up when, out of the blue, Harris referenced John Travolta’s notorious mangling of Idina Menzel’s name at last year’s Oscars. “Benedict Cumberbatch is not only the best name in show business, it’s also the sound you get when you ask John Travolta to pronounce Ben Affleck,” he quipped.

Still, Travolta found a way to turn redemption into renewed disrepute, as he began bizarrely pawing Menzel on the face while cooing her name. “You, my darling, my beautiful, my wickedly talented Idina Menzel!” he said. “Is that right?" Yes. It was right. It was also very wrong.

The Oscars; annual In Memoriam segment upset fans of the late Joan Rivers by failing to include the tart-tongued comic; it also did not include Elaine Stritch. Both women had done some film work – Rivers had even directed and co-written the (widely maligned) 1978 comedy feature Rabbit Test – but both were better known for their TV or stage work. That didn’t stop an explosion of online outrage, including one from a fan who tweeted a photo of late-vintage Rivers giving the finger to the viewer.

#JoanRivers responds to In Memoriam snub #Oscars2015 pic.twitter.com/c1bhgwaNCO

— Chris Azzopardi (@chrisazzopardi) February 23, 2015

When Neil Patrick Harris introduced presenter Dakota Johnson, star of the sexually explicit blockbuster Fifty Shades of Grey, he joked that she was “the reason you had to explain to your grandmother what a spanking bench is.”

Yet, during the red carpet Oscars pre-show, ABC censors bleeped a couple of words – one of which our lip-reading friends assured us started with the letter ‘s’ and ended with the letter ‘t’ – uttered by Johnson. And during the main show itself, the word ‘God’ was excised from a film clip of nominee Robert Duvall, in character in the film The Judge, exclaiming: ‘Goddamn.’

Even though Hollywood put its most socially progressive face forward, some still found reason to complain. At the end of the evening, when presenter Sean Penn opened the envelope for Best Picture, he spotted the name of his friend, the Mexican director-producer of Birdman, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, and quipped: “Who gave this son of a bitch a green card?”

It was clearly a joke – when Inarritu took the stage, he gave Penn a long bear hug – but the irony of the quip was evidently lost on a mass of trigger-happy tweeters, who accused the actor of insensitivity, at best, or racism. In fact, Penn smiled as Inarritu spoke of Mexicans who live in the U.S., sometimes illegally: “I just pray that they can be treated with the same dignity and respect of the ones that came before and built this incredible immigrant nation.”

Later, Inarritu was asked about Penn’s quip backstage. He noted that he and Penn are old friends – they made the movie 21 Grams together – and that, in any case, he was charmed by the actor’s joke. “I didn’t find it offensive,” he told reporters. “I thought it was very funny.”