Oscars + Zelenskyy? Hollywood still doesn’t get it
There’s clueless, and then there’s Hollywood.
As Russia continues to rain down devastation on his country, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has become a symbol of his nation’s courage in the fight for freedom.
“Nobody is going to break us,” he said.
Zelenskyy has pleaded his case for support and military aid virtually before the European Parliament, United Nations and Congress.
That’s not enough apparently for Amy Schumer, co-host of this year’s Academy Awards. She had the bright-as-a-blown-bulb idea to pitch Zelenskyy for a guest appearance at the Oscars.
“I think there is definitely pressure in one way to be like, ‘This is a vacation, let people forget we just want to have this night,’ but it is like, ‘Well we have so many eyes and ears on this show,’” Schumer told Drew Barrymore on an upcoming episode of her eponymous daytime talk snow (via ET Canada), Variety reported.
We hate to burst Schumer’s bubble, but the people taking the “vacation” are those who’ll be watching something else on Sunday.
As CNBC reported last year, Hollywood’s biggest night is a big yawn for most of the country. The 2021 Oscar telecast hit a new ratings low, with 10.4 million people watching, according to Nielsen data. That’s a nearly 56% drop from the 23.6 million viewers that turned on their TVs for the program in 2020. We can only imagine that those “many eyes and ears on the show” refer to pets left home alone with TVs switched on by their owners.
“I actually pitched, I wanted to find a way to have Zelenskyy satellite in or make a tape or something just because there are so many eyes on the Oscars,” Schumer added. “I am not afraid to go there, but it’s not me producing the Oscars.”
And what would the president of a country fighting for its very existence have to say to the Hollywood stars inside L.A.’s Dolby Theater? They aren’t lawmakers — thank the good Lord — they can’t bring about the no-fly zone that Zelenskyy wants. They have no tangible power outside their own minds and the confines of the industry.
“Getting Zelenskyy” could only serve as an attention grab for a show that hemorrhages viewers by the year.
Schumer kept going: “I think it’s a great opportunity to at least comment on a couple of things. I have some jokes that kind of highlight the sort of current condition. I mean, there are so many awful things happening that it seems hard to focus on which one.”
Russia bombed a maternity hospital, causing the deaths of mothers and babies. It shelled a home for disabled adults and children. The siege of Mariupol has left the port city littered with smoldering craters where buildings once stood. There is no need for tasteless, oblivious jokes to “highlight the sort of current situation.” People watch it every day on the news.
War and suffering are not a prop for “Hollywood’s biggest night” to appear relevant, but one can almost guarantee that studio honchos are already planning a movie about the crisis in Ukraine as you read this. And cosseted actors who pay people to curate their closets and manage their Botox appointments will audition to play versions of the brave men and women who are standing up to those who would bomb them out of existence.
The winner of the worst idea goes to … Amy Schumer.