Oscars Wrap-Up: What Went Wrong

As much as I've raved about James Franco as an actor, artist and all-around fascinating figure, the Oscars telecast last night did not live up to my expectations. Although, to be honest I don't know what we were expecting - neither James Franco nor Anne Hathaway are comedians and they obviously didn't write their own material. So many times last night, I wished Ricky Gervais would magically appear to save the show. Or maybe that Billy Crystal would just take over - his was pretty much the only part of the show that ended up laugh-worthy.

Anne Hathaway is annoying on her own and even more so when she's trying to be funny. The two didn't have even a little bit of chemistry although I never find her to have much chemistry with any of her co-stars. And today, the media is buzzing that James Franco was on something (perhaps some weed?) but I honestly think he just got progressively bored and tired - at times he could hardly keep his eyes open. The crazy over-achiever is already simultaneously enrolled in three grad programs right now and I read he doesn't get much sleep. But I mean, when you know you're going to host the Oscars...maybe you should stock up on the Visine and take a nap beforehand.

James did give his Twitter followers a backstage pass to the event, which was exciting for social media buffs like me. He even filmed his first appearance on-stage and posted it to Twitter right away so we could see what he saw, and get kind-of the same experience he had on-stage. That really is social media at its finest – rewarding your followers with exclusive material they won't find anywhere else.

Forget the terrible production and the bad hosting, the worst part of last night was Melissa Leo. I have a huge problem with winners acting all surprised when they were in fact the favourite to win. And Melissa Leo, who won Best Supporting Actress last night, basically should've had her award taken away for the terrible acting during her acceptance speech. I get that winning an Oscar is the Nobel Prize of acting, and that after a life-long career, it's a celebration, blah-blah-blah, but really?! She's pretty much won every Supporting Actress award this awards season so why was she SO shocked to win, and why did she have an emotional breakdown on-stage, complete with an F-bomb? Her 'surprised and overcome-with-emotions' act was just that - an act. It was so terribly fake, it made me completely forget how much I loved her performance in The Fighter. As it is, I'm annoyed with her after those 'Consider Me' ads she took out herself, to promote her Oscar nomination to the Academy voters. Not that she didn't deserve it but she basically pimped herself out to win an Oscar.



I had made my own Oscar predictions, and here's how I did – not very well, as it turns out!