By Mikayla Silcox
Elm Staff Writer
Over the past decade, the Academy Awards faced numerous shake-ups that would forever change the fabric of the ceremony — 2016’s #OscarsSoWhite movement, 2017’s “Moonlight” and “La La Land” best picture mix-up, and the historic best picture win for “Parasite” in 2020 — but nothing changed the show quite like last year’s infamous slap.
Audiences around the world froze in astonishment after host Chris Rock’s joke about Jada Pinkett Smith swung and missed during the 2022 ceremony, prompting Will Smith to slap him in the face.
While the showrunners tried to make the 2022 ceremony relevant for audiences according to previous Elm coverage, nothing grabbed the public’s attention quite like the organic drama between Smith and Rock. According to The New York Times, 550,000 people tuned in following the incident, boosting viewership 58% from the 2021 ceremony.
People were quick to voice their opinion about the situation, with celebrities and viewers alike chiming in with their thoughts on Twitter.
“He could have killed him,” comedian Judd Apatow said in a Tweet that is now deleted. “That’s pure out of control rage and violence.”
In another deleted Tweet, Congressman Jamaal Bowman defended Smith’s slap. “Teachable moment: Don’t joke about a Black woman’s hair,” Bowman said.
With the controversy stirred up by the slap, the producers of the 2023 Academy Awards, Ricky Kirshner and Glen Weiss, scrambled to develop contingency plans for future incidents.
According to Vanity Fair, the show hired a crisis team to mitigate any issues that the 2023 show might run into.
Since the slap, few award shows have set a precedent for what a “normal” ceremony might look like. The 2022/2023 awards season is riddled with missteps and chaos, which leaves an opening for the Oscars to reset their image post-slap.
One instance of chaos was at the Feb. 19 British Academy Film Awards. Rising star Ariana Debose, who won a BAFTA last year for her performance as Anita in the 2021 film “West Side Story,” hosted,and performed an original rap to open the ceremony.
The performance quickly went viral, with Twitter users creating memes about DeBose’s out-of-breath performance and unconventional pronunciations of celebrity names. According to Us Weekly, DeBose deleted her Twitter account following the public’s response.
“I think a lot of people don’t like change, and there’s a view that the BAFTAs have to be this slightly stiff, traditional British, middle-England messaging, but American awards shows have much more razzmatazz,” BAFTAs producer Nick Bullen said to Variety in DeBose’s defense.
DeBose may have been on to something. While the slap regained the public’s interest in the Oscars, producers are looking to sustain relevancy.
According to CNBC, award show viewership slowly declined throughout the 2010s, with the Oscars hitting a record low in 2021. To amend this, award ceremonies across mediums, including the Academy Awards, the Emmy Awards, and the Grammy Awards, are seeking the help of influencers to drum up interest amongst Gen Z and Gen Alpha.
Last year, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences teamed up with TikTok creators to produce promotional content. Users @straw_hat_goofy and @guywithamoviecamera were invited to the 94th Oscars ceremony to provide recaps and coverage to draw in younger audiences.
Additionally, according to The Hollywood Reporter, the Academy signed an exclusive deal with Meta, inviting 12 Instagram influencers to create behind-the-scenes content that was posted to Facebook and Instagram.
While producers cannot capture the same controversy stirred by the alternation between Smith and Rock, — and are not looking to, if the task force is any evidence — the structure of award shows is changing. Whether attendees are rapping or answering silly TikTok questions, award shows shifted from tradition to appeal to younger audiences. Perhaps award shows are not dying, just evolving into a new beast fueled by virality.
Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Photo caption:Last year, actor Will Smith made global headlines after slapping Chris Rock follow a joke the presenter made about Jada Pinkett Smith’s struggle with alopecia.