Hollywood Babble On & On #835: Oscar's In Chaos

Wow.

Yesterday I wrote a rather tongue in cheek post about who might replace Brett Ratner if he got turfed from the Oscars. 

Little did I know that my little attempt at humor, complete with satirical social commentary, would turn out to be not only true, but desperately needed.

In case you're living in a cave Senor Ratner is out at the Oscars, and if that isn't enough chaos for you Eddie Murphy has dropped out of the hosting gig.

I actually pity the fool who takes on the job as producer of the Oscar telecast, and I'm not saying that because of my never-ending admiration for Mr. T.

I really do think whoever takes the job will be deserving a spot on my "poor bastard" list.

Let's look at the facts of the case.

1. A lot of the budget has already been spent. This is not an insurmountable problem, because the Academy, and the ABC network can kick in some more into the kitty because it's still a pretty major TV event.  However, the ratings of past Oscars have been iffy, and it's not good to lose the safety cushion of a nice profit margin.

2. Putting together a large scale live telecast is a huge time consuming job, and Ratner's replacement will have less than half the time to do it than Ratner.  They will not only have to make decisions regarding the new business that will pop up, but will have to review and probably redo just about every decision made during the Ratner regime.

3. Finding a host for the Oscars isn't easy.  Billy Crystal's eager, but since the Ratnerati shot him down rather publicly, it's unlikely he'll continue to be eager about it. Whoever takes the hosting gig, even if it's The Muppets, will have less than half the time to prepare, and then there's problem #4...

4.  If every joke is not a smash gut-buster, and every intro, segue, presentation, and acceptance speech not smoother than greased silk, the critics, punters, and internet wankers like me will shit on the replacement host and producer without mercy.  It doesn't matter how hard they try, because sniping that this year's Oscars was the worst Oscars almost as popular as soccer as a global past-time.

However, all is not doom and gloom.

The simple fact that all this chaos and sturm und drang is happening could make people who wouldn't normally watch the Oscars tune in.  There will be a lot of schadenfreude about Hollywood in flyover country and it could turn into pure ratings gold.

So if the reports that Brian Grazer is taking it on turn out to be true, I'm going to wish him, or whoever gets the job, a lot of luck, because they are going to need it.

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UPDATE: Brian Grazer has taken the job, and is moving fast to stabilize the situation, and the word is that Billy Crystal is at least in talks to be the host again.  Sorry Muppets.