Humans, by nature, do their best to adapt, and that’s what society has tried to do during the pandemic. Even frivolous things, like awards shows, have been forced to evolve. The BET Awards and the Emmys even created some of their most charming and watchable telecasts with shows done mostly remotely, with armies of equipment actually mailed to nominees all over the world. It’s a lesson, alas, that one major awards show is not taking to heart.
As per Variety, next year’s Academy Awards will not be a virtual affair, with casts and crew delivering impassioned speeches from their couches. “The Oscars in-person telecast will happen,” a source bluntly told the publication, suggesting the show will go on as it did in the before-time, in a bygone era when there wasn’t a highly contagious virus running roughshod over the planet.
Early into the pandemic, the Academy bumped the show back from late February to April 15, hoping that a year was enough time for humans to sort this out. Humans did not sort it out. Perhaps they’re remaining optimistic, hoping that the public health crisis that is currently worse than it ever has, and with no end in sight, could still get better in the next four and a half months. But they’ll still need to cram untold stars into the Dolby Theatre’s 3,400 seats, and a good number of them are definitely in the immunocompromised bracket.
Of course, it’s still December, with a month — still, somehow — left in this cursed year. Maybe once Jack Nicholson says he’s not risking his life to fête some movie that never got the chance to play in an actual movie theater, the Academy may sing a different tune.
(Via Variety)
