Every Single Thing That Happened at the 2025 Oscars

6

Every year, we arrive at the Oscars somewhat exhausted by the monthslong awards season, which this year involved a controversial front-running film, the plentiful problematic tweets of its lead actress, and precursor awards and voting windows that had to move dates due to the catastrophic L.A. wildfires. Now, it’s time to down that second cup of coffee, because Oscar night is here, and it’s the most uncertain race in years. What we do know is that Conan O’Brien is hosting for the first time, Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande are set to perform something from Wicked; Lord only knows what Doja Cat, Lisa, and Raye will get up to, and June Squibb is in the building. And we’re on it! We’ll be tracking all the presenter pairs, surprise wins, and acceptance speech moments both ridiculous and sublime. Join us! —Joe Reid

Copied

joe reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:54 PM EST

Sean Baker’s four-Oscar night sets an all-time record

It was an incredible night for Brighton Beach, sex workers, and indie film, as Sean Baker’s Anora completed its marathon from Cannes all the way to the Oscar stage. The film won five of the six awards it was nominated for: Mikey Madison for Best Actress, and then four more for the film’s writer, director, producer, and editor, Sean Baker.

Baker’s jack-of-all-trades routine set an all-time Academy Award record, as he’s now the only person to ever individually win four Oscars for the same film. Walt Disney previously won four Oscars in a single night at the 26th Oscars in 1954, but those were for four separate short films.

Copied

Hershal Pandya Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:49 PM EST

Can’t wait to wake up tomorrow and realize Adrien Brody is still talking

Copied

Alison Willmore Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:46 PM EST

Ten years ago Sean Baker was shooting a movie on iPhones

Copied

roxana hadadi Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:44 PM EST

HUGE fan of all these people running from the back to get onstage for Anora, it’s actually charming

Copied

Julie Kosin Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:43 PM EST

Best Picture: Anora!

Copied

Bethy Squires Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:40 PM EST

Sean Baker was right, streaming sucks!

Copied

anne victoria clark Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:40 PM EST

I’m shocked that all my streams went down like people didn’t expect the Oscars to go past 10:30

Copied

roxana hadadi Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:39 PM EST

I do wonder how much anti-genre bias played into Mikey’s win

I am really so shocked, it felt like Demi had this in the bag a while ago. The Oscars just became a meta-text re-enactment of The Substance.

Copied

Julie Kosin Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:38 PM EST

Hulu cut out just as Mikey Madison won Best Actress for Anora

A huge upset as Demi Moore was expected to win for The Substance.

Copied

nate jones Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:33 PM EST

There is a steady undercurrent of ‘fuck streaming’ to these Oscars that I’m enjoying

Copied

jason p. frank Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:32 PM EST

Sean Baker accepted Best Director for Anora (his third award of the night) with a plea to ‘reverse the trend’ of movie theaters closing. Does it look like Anora is winning Best Picture? It sure does.

Copied

anne victoria clark Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:27 PM EST

No one has ever wanted to go home more than Cillian Murphy

Maybe Ralph Fiennes.

Copied

Zoë Haylock Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:26 PM EST

Club Chalamet has spoken

Copied

Alison Willmore Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:25 PM EST

You watch Brody in The Brutalist and it’s really like, you are a goddamn movie star

He takes his second Best Actor Oscar.

Copied

julie kosin Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:23 PM EST

Okay but why didn’t Adrien Brody kiss Cillian Murphy?

Copied

bilge ebiri Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:21 PM EST

My mom just texted me, “Is this the best Oscar ceremony in many many years?” And I texted, “Yes.”

Copied

joe reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:19 PM EST

If Timmy wins, this would be the most Best Picture nominees (nine) to win at least one award at a single ceremony.

Copied

Bethy Squires Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:22 PM EST

The Bond In Memoriam was longer than Quincy Jones’s

Copied

jackson mchenry Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:17 PM EST

Every awards show should have Queen Latifah come out and perform a song — preferably ‘When You’re Good to Mama’ from Chicago — but I will heartily accept a performance of ‘Ease on Down the Road’ as part of a Quincy Jones tribute.

Why didn’t more people in the audience aside from Ariana, Cynthia, and Colman stand up and dance?

Copied

Fran Hoepfner Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:16 PM EST

Daniel Blumberg recorded a lot of The Brutalist score piecemeal, traveling in order to accommodate the legendary jazz musicians he wanted to work with.

For the film’s scenes in the marble quarry in Carrara, Blumberg went to the mines himself to make field recordings that he’d later layer into the music.

Copied

joe reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:09 PM EST

Whoopi on the Oscar stage where she belongs

Copied

Alison Willmore Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:08 PM EST

I love that the cool composers are all such delicate weirdos

Copied

rebecca alter Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:07 PM EST

The single best thing about The Brutalist just won!

Its score by Daniel Blumberg! Lovely and epic!

Copied

jen chaney Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:05 PM EST

Oh the category without the Challengers score, whoopee

Copied

Hershal Pandya Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:02 PM EST

I love the three seconds where they tell us ‘The oscars will continue’ before they cut back to commercial. It’s like when you’re on hold with the bank and you hear ‘your call is important to us.’

Copied

Roxana Hadadi Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:01 PM EST

To be clear, we love billionaire Walter Salles

Copied

bilge ebiri Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:00 PM EST

Walter Salles could buy the Academy if he wanted to, you do NOT play him off.

Copied

jason p. frank Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 10:00 PM EST

It’s a shock (and a thrill for many) that Emilia Pérez lost Best International Feature Film to I’m Still Here.

On nominations morning, Emilia Pérez was just one nomination from tying the record for most nominations of all time and was considered a potential frontrunner for Best Picture. Now, one X-based scandal and a lot of online derision later, the film can’t even win a category it was slated to run away with. Brazil wins!

Copied

bilge ebiri Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:57 PM EST

Penelope SHOULD be presenting Best Supporting Actress because she SHOULD have won it last year for FERRARI

Copied

joe reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:54 PM EST

The Brutalist is on the board with a Best Cinematography win

Copied

roxana hadadi Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:53 PM EST

Shout out to Willem Dafoe for reminding us of Nosferatu’s full frontal

Copied

Fran Hoepfner Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:53 PM EST

Whenever Alba Rohrwacher appears anywhere I expect her to say ‘estimate the inestimable’ from La Chimera

Copied

Fran Hoepfner Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:50 PM EST

No Michelle Trachtenberg? I know that was recent but so was Gene …

Copied

joe reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:49 PM EST

The In Memoriam segment will never not be the most complained about element of the Oscars

Unless there is physical violence. Or Chadwick Boseman loses posthumously.

Copied

Bilge Ebiri Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:49 PM EST

Reminder that ‘Lacrimosa’ is an Oscar song because it plays over Mozart’s funeral in Best Picture winner Amadeus, which won 40 years ago

It was a perfect In Memoriam choice.

Copied

rebecca alter Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:43 PM EST

This In Memoriam music is all wrong. It’s that music that plays when grape juice spills on a carpet in slow motion in a paper-towel commercial.

Especially with David Lynch’s passing! They could’ve had someone sing “Llorando.” Or “Mysteries of Love.” It really is more powerful with live vocals. Or if they just wanted instrumental, Laura Palmer’s theme?? That music just wasn’t terribly sentimental, it was ominous. It should be SAD and SWEET not SCARY.

Copied

Kathryn VanArendonk Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:43 PM EST

‘Lacrimosa’ is like the most on the nose an In Memoriam can get???

Copied

Hershal Pandya Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:41 PM EST

Morgan Freeman starts speaking and now I feel like he’s introducing a new Chappelle special.

Will never forgive Chappelle for this.

Copied

roxana hadadi Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:39 PM EST

At an increasingly self-referential Oscars, Victoria Warmerdam told her partner, Trent, during their speech for Best Live Action Short Film that ‘I’m not having your babies because of this statue.’

Icon behavior. Kieran, whatever you and Jazz do is your business, but now you’ve made it, like, everyone’s business!

Copied

Joe Reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:38 AM EST

The tradition of the worst live-action short winning is too strong

The Man Who Could Not Remain Silent should have.

Copied

Alejandra Gularte Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:35 PM EST

They should make a second Better Man so it can be nominated again

Even Better-er Man —Bethy Squires
Bestest Man —Alejandra Gularte
Robbie does have more memoirs. —Bilge Ebiri

Copied

bilge ebiri Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:32 PM EST

One day in the future everyone will pretend to have rooted for Better Man

Copied

Alejandra Gularte Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:31 PM EST

Better Man robbed

Copied

julie kosin Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:30 PM EST

Dune: Part Two picks up back to back Oscars for Best Sound and Visual Effects

Copied

nate jones Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:20 PM EST

During that commercial break, Colman Domigo came onstage and offered a toast to Los Angeles then made people get up and dance

Copied

Hershal Pandya Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:16 PM EST

As great as Abraham’s speech was, I can’t help but think about how unfortunate it is that it took this long for anyone to say this so explicitly at an awards show

Not to take anything away from Jonathan Glazer, who was brave enough to express a similar, albeit less comprehensive, sentiment during his acceptance speech last year, and faced a great deal of backlash for it. But that we can still count the number of times a humanitarian crisis of this scale has been acknowledged at these events is hard to process.

Copied

Roxana Hadadi Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:13 PM EST

No Other Land doesn’t have American distribution, but it does have an Oscar for Best Documentary Feature

All four directors of the film, created by a Palestinian and Israeli collective of creatives who have been working together for years, were at the Oscars to accept their award, with Basel Adra and Yuval Abraham (who appear on-screen the most, and whose friendship is the backbone of the film) each speaking at the podium. Their speeches were both incredibly explicit about what has been going on in Gaza and the West Bank since October 7, 2023, with Adra talking about his hope that his daughter will live in a different political reality than he has, and Abraham pointing out that American foreign policy has long failed the Palestinian people. “Can’t you see that we are intertwined? … There is another way. It’s not too late,” Abraham says. See this movie now, please. You know that Guy Pearce already has, with that “Free Palestine” pin on his lapel and his daps to the filmmaking team as they took the stage.

Copied

Kathryn VanArendonk Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:10 PM EST

The sandworm plays all the instruments most known for needing hands

Copied

Jackson McHenry Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:09 PM EST

ANYTHING IS FUNNY WHEN YOU PUT IT IN A BOW TIE. ESPECIALLY IF IT IS A GIANT SPACE WORM.

HE CAN PLAY THE PIANO AND HE CAN PLAY THE HARP HE IS SO TALENTED.

Copied

jen chaney Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:08 PM EST

Camille and Clément Ducol break out into song as they accept their Oscar … everyone involved in this film is insufferable

Copied

Bethy Squires Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:05 PM EST

Two Emilia Pérez wins and still no explicit mention of trans rights

Copied

Roxana Hadadi Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:03 PM EST

We could’ve had ‘Compress / Repress,’ but NO

Copied

Alison Willmore Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:03 PM EST

Two Emilia Pérez wins as “El Mal” wins for Best Original Song

Copied

joe reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:02 PM EST

The worst Best Original Song lineup of my lifetime

Worse than the year the Sam Smith James Bond song won over the Weeknd’s song from Fifty Shades of Grey and something called “Simple Song #3” from a Paolo Sorrentino movie about two horny old men? Yes!!

Copied

Bethy Squires Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 9:01 PM EST

I neeeeeed Diane Warren to win for the worst song of her career

Copied

Joe Reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:53 PM EST

Mid-Oscars check-in: Sean Baker is two for two!

We’ve passed a few of the crucial mile-markers of the first half of tonight’s Oscar ceremony, and tea leaves are looking very good for Anora. While Yura Borisov wasn’t expected to pull off some kind of miracle upset in Best Supporting Actor, Anora has taken the other two awards it was up for so far. Sean Baker — who is personally nominated for four awards tonight — is currently two for two, winning Best Original Screenplay (fending off a close challenge by A Real Pain) and Best Editing. With three nominations yet to be decided in Best Actress, Best Director, and Best Picture, Anora has hit all the mile markers it’s needed to. If Baker can take Director and Picture, he’ll tie Walt Disney for the most Oscars won by an individual in a single night (and the only person to do it all for one film).

Elsewhere, the Academy has spread the wealth among the nominated films, bestowing two awards to Wicked (costumes and production design) and one apiece for The Substance (makeup), Conclave (adapted screenplay), A Real Pain (supporting actor), and Emilia Pérez (supporting actress). That makes for half of the ten Best Picture nominees to have picked up at least one Oscar thus far.

Also! Flow crossed the finish line of its storybook awards season, becoming the first Latvian film to win the Best Animated Feature Oscar.

Copied

Rebecca Alter Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:51 PM EST

After Sean Baker thanked his dog after winning Best Editing, Zoë Saldaña shouts out her husband’s hair while accepting the award for Supporting Actress

Copied

bilge ebiri Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:36 PM EST

That Bond tribute was exactly the kind of nonsense the Oscars are good for

The Oscars are best when they’re flirting with (and occasionally tripping full-on into) bad taste. What’s beautiful about that Bond tribute is that it contains all of the Oscars’ modes: ridiculous, elegant, beautiful, awful, unnecessary, and unforgettable all at once.

Also probably served as a good obituary for the James Bond franchise, now that Amazon is poised to shit all over it.

Copied

Dee Lockett Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:31 PM EST

But now they gotta actually hire Lisa for a bond song

Copied

Anne Victoria Clark Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:30 PM EST

Wild that they used the flying in from the ceiling for the Bond tribute and not ‘Defying Gravity’

Copied

Rebecca Alter Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:29 PM EST

For the tribute to James Bond, Margaret Qualley brings back my FAVORITE lost Oscars tradition: an elaborate interpretive-dance sequence!

Copied

Bethy Squires Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:27 PM EST

Lotta people talking about who should be the next James Bond. Lotta people talking about how June Squibb was robbed of a nom for Thelma.

There’s a great way to fix both these problems, folks!

Copied

Jackson McHenry Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:22 PM EST

June Squibb has perfect comedic timing

Copied

Roxana Hadadi Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:21 PM EST

The Substance wins Best Makeup and Hairstyling

And Stéphanie Guillon and Marilyne Scarselli are wearing neon-green accents. I think I approve of theme dressing now.

Copied

nicholas quah Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:16 PM EST

Just realized Rossellini is wearing blue velvet

A really sweet tribute to David Lynch.

Photo: WWD via Getty Images

Copied

Alison Willmore Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:14 PM EST

Let’s keep this Conclave vs. Anora suspense going

It is widely agreed that Anora and Conclave are the favorites to win Best Picture and I appreciate that the screenplay categories are getting us off to a good start by awarding both.

Copied

Alejandra Gularte Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:13 PM EST

I’m glad the pope is alive to witness Conclave win Best Adapted Screenplay

Copied

Jason P. Frank Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:12 PM EST

Anora wins its first Oscar, for Best Original Screenplay, for Sean Baker

This is a great sign for Anora’s Best Picture chances, since this could have very easily gone to other Oscar faves A Real Pain or The Brutalist. Does this mean it’s going to win? No guarantees, but Brighton Beach’s chances are looking up.

Copied

Joe Reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:06 PM EST

The Soderbergh Oscars were underrated

That Costume Design presentation — with cast members from each of the nominated films standing in front of sketches of looks from the films, paying tribute to the designers — hearkens back to the good parts of the oft-maligned Steven Soderbergh–produced COVID Oscars. That ceremony presented the crafts categories by letting the individual nominees monologue about themselves and their art. It was an admirable decision to put the focus on the people who actually make the movies we love, we just would have liked to actually see the product they got nominated for. Tonight’s approach was a welcome improvement.

Copied

Jason P. Frank Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 8:03 PM EST

Paul Tazewell just became the first Black man to win the Best Costume Design Oscar for his work on Wicked

One of the most iconic Broadway customers of the past 20 years (ever heard of Hamilton?), Tazewell is the second Black person to win the category overall, following Ruth E. Carter for Black Panther in 2019 and Wakanda Forever. He also has a Tony Award for Hamilton and an Emmy for The Wiz Live! We’d say that’s a recipe for an EGOT, but there’s no Grammy for costuming … yet.

Copied

Jackson McHenry Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:57 PM EST

It feels as if the Oscars are purposefully emphasizing the work of the craftspeople this year

In light of Conan’s speech about the ceremony honoring the industry in general. It’s a good choice that reminds you how much human labor goes into every film, and something they should do every year!

Copied

Jackson McHenry Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:54 PM EST

Lithgow really killing it tonight

“Bowen, we barely know each other.”

Copied

Joe Reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:52 PM EST

They still haven’t figured out how to thread the Best Picture nominees throughout the show without it feeling too slight

Copied

Kathryn VanArendonk Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:49 PM EST

Conan showing the location of Latvia, which brought us Flow, mid commercial break after the Doctor Odyssey ad

Photo: ABC

Copied

Joe Reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:47 PM EST

They are not rushing things along, a marked change from how things had gotten a few years ago

Copied

Roxana Hadadi Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:45 PM EST

Screaming in Iranian delight over In the Shadow of the Cypress

The winner for Best Animated Short Film.

Copied

Kathryn VanArendonk Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:44 PM EST

Proof that cats are Oscar voters

Copied

Alejandra Gularte Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:43 PM EST

FLOW HIVE WE RISE

MEOW MEOW MEOW!

Copied

Rebecca Alter Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:43 PM EST

Flow wins for best animated film, the evil (Inside Out 2) has been defeated!

Copied

Joe Reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:39 PM EST

Impromptu tributes to Goldie Hawn? These Oscars are for me

Copied

Rebecca Alter Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:36 PM EST

Kieran Culkin wins the first and most predictable award of the night for his performance as a very annoying cousin in A Real Pain

And uses the opportunity to ask his wife in public for more kids. Ever so slightly Elon-ish but tbh the wuvvable rascal gets away with it! Excited to see what role he takes on next after this wild couple of years.

Copied

bilge ebiri Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:42 PM EST

That Rolex commercial was good but cutting from a shot of Scorsese directing to a shot of Leo in The Great Gatsby is unforgivable

It was a montage of athletes and movie people set to “The Ecstasy of Gold.”

Copied

Kathryn VanArendonk Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:32 PM EST

Awards ceremonies have been an unusually transparent look into Kieran Culkin’s reproductive planning?

Copied

Morgan Baila Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:31 PM EST

Kieran shouting out Jeremy Strong in his Best Supporting Actor acceptance speech is cute

It was also mostly bleeped out.

Copied

Kathryn VanArendonk Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:30 PM EST

Conan immediately rockets to ‘oh, THAT guy gets it’ status

Conan pulls off an Oscars opening that feels completely effortless while also being a painstaking, tonally careful blend of all the things monologues have to do. He was sincere about the L.A. wildfires, he was a little sharp in a joke about Karla Sofía Gascón, and he made jokes about the specific role of Oscars hosting with a musical number called “I Won’t Waste Time” (featuring the sandworm from Dune on keyboard). He pulls it off in part because his particular brand of comedy has always been stratospherically absurd but never nihilistic or cruel. A pro.

Copied

Joe Reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:29 PM EST

They need to extend Conan to next year before this night is over

Copied

Hershal Pandya Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:27 PM EST

I’ve never seen a callback to another award-show monologue before

Adam Sandler’s “Timothée Chalamet” at the Golden Globes got an extension courtesy of Conan’s opening monologue.

Copied

Roxana Hadadi Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:23 PM EST

All four No Other Land directors made it

Photo: Penske Media via Getty Images

With all the increased violence in the West Bank after the Israel-Hamas ceasefire (which Basel Adra and Yuval Abraham spoke to us about), it’s nice to see all four directors of No Other Land — Abraham, Adra, Hamdan Ballal, and Rachel Szor — make it to the Oscars where they should, you know, win.

Copied

Jackson McHenry Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:26 PM EST

Ugh I love the Lithgow bit so much

If only more people watched Trial & Error on NBC, he wouldn’t have to play Dumbledore.

Copied

Alison Willmore Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:17 PM EST

Lots of throwback glamour tonight, lots of silvery metallics

For the most part, the stars looked good, but I could have used some Cher or a swan dress. That said, here are my extremely subjective PERSONAL FAVORITE LOOKS from the red carpet:

Lisa
I still don’t entirely understand what’s going on here — it is a tux that is also a gown, or are there pants underneath there? I can’t tell, but amongst a bunch of safe choices, it stands out.

Photo: Mike Coppola/Getty Images

June Squibb
Sparkly caftan type thing! It’s so good!

Photo: Gilbert Flores/Penske Media via Getty Images

Cynthia Erivo
I am on the record as being over Ariana Grande’s Glinda-themed run, but the thing about playing the misunderstood supposed villainess is that you get cooler villainess-inspired outfits, and Erivo wears the velvet and dramatic collar so well.

Photo: Gilbert Flores/Penske Media via Getty Images

Sebastian Stan
There were a few bold brown looks among the guys — Jeremy Strong’s russet suit, Andrew Garfield’s disco look — but I am very stuck on the tan shirt Stan is wearing with his tux. It’s just off enough to look like it could be dirty, or like someone spilled tea on him, or like it sat around in a box yellowing with age. I like it! Subversive!

Photo: Gilbert Flores/Penske Media via Getty Images

Demi Moore
She came to win an Oscar and she goddamn deserves it in this dress. She looks incredible.

Photo: Gilbert Flores/Penske Media via Getty Images

Copied

Jackson McHenry Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:15 PM EST

How to even catalogue the many highlights

Of having Cynthia and Ariana do a grand Oz medley of The Wizard of Oz’s “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” (Ariana) into The Wiz’s “Home” (Cynthia) into Wicked’s own “Defying Gravity” (a duet in which Ariana also had to supply both the Glinda and the guards who go “we have to bring her down!” vocal lines)? It gave us a grand tribute to L.A. with background shots of the city, Erivo’s trademark ability to hit insane notes without vocal strain, and reaction shots of Ethan Slater and a crying Michelle Yeoh. Glamour! Indulgence! The reminder we have to endure another 12 months of this press tour! All we want from an event like this.

Copied

Joe Reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:06 PM EST

What to watch for tonight

What would be an Oscar Night without stakes?? Tonight’s Academy Awards are about more than just gold statues handed out in 23 categories. They’re the culmination of months’ worth of campaigns, speculation, scandal, and most of all narratives. We Oscar freaks love a good Oscar narrative, and tonight’s show will feature the payoff for a bunch of them.

Is it Anora’s big night?
Anora enters the evening as the betting favorite to win Best Picture, but Sean Baker’s movie has only been in that position for a scant few weeks now, during which time it’s picked up awards from the Producers Guild, Director’s Guild, and Critics Choice, but has lost the top awards at the BAFTAs and SAG Awards (both of those going to Conclave). What does it all mean?? With six total nominations, Anora’s performance in a few categories earlier in the ceremony could be a window into how voters felt about it:Best Original Screenplay: Baker took the Writers Guild Award for Anora, while Jesse Eisenberg won the BAFTA for A Real Pain.

• Best Film Editing: Baker could also win here for his editing, but this category feels truly up for grabs. A win for The Brutalist wouldn’t be great for Anora; a win for Conclave could signal an upset brewing.

• Best Actress: Demi Moore rebounded from a loss to Anora’s Mikey Madison at the BAFTAs with a win at SAG, to remain in the driver’s seat to win the Oscar. If Madison pulls out the upset here, the Anora narrative will feel mighty strong.

• Best Director: If Anora is going to win Best Picture, Sean Baker will likely win Best Director, but that’s not a guarantee. The last decade or so has seen a trend towards splitting up Picture and Director, with the latter award going to films with more sweeping scope and technological achievement. Don’t be shocked if The Brutalist’s Brady Corbet sneaks out a win.

How far did Emilia Pérez fall?
Karla Sofía Gascón’s toxic tweets were the reason most Oscar pundits shot the French film down their list of predicted winners in most categories. But Oscar voters aren’t necessarily guaranteed to follow suit. Emilia just cleaned up at the César Awards (the French Oscars), and with the Academy membership more international than it’s ever been, Jacques Audiard’s maligned film could still pick up awards in Best International Feature, Best Original Song, and Best Sound, in addition to Zoe Saldaña’s widely predicted win in Best Supporting Actress.

Will Timmy supplant Adrien as Oscar’s favorite boy?
Adrien Brody spent all season picking up Best Actor awards for his acclaimed performance in The Brutalist, even though the drumbeat for him to win a second Oscar, after he triumphed in this same category for 2002’s The Pianist never felt all that strong. At that time, Brody broke the record as the youngest Best Actor winner ever at age 29. But after A Complete Unknown’s Timothée Chalamet took Best Actor at the SAG Awards last weekend, he’s now poised to score a late-breaking Oscar win, and with it take the youngest Best Actor winner designation away from Brody, if only by a matter of several months.

Could it finally be Diane Warren’s time?
The prolific songwriter has been nominated a grand total of 16 times and in ten of the last eleven years. And while nothing in that last decade has approached the grandeur of her old hits like “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing” and “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now,” Warren has hit the campaign trail hard every year, not even letting up after winning an honorary Oscar in 2022. With Emilia Perez’s two Best Original Songs now imperiled because of the Karla tweet scandal, some folks are wondering if the door is now open for Warren to finally win. It would help if people could remember anything about her nominated song — “The Journey” from the Tyler Perry disaster The Six Triple Eight — but Oscar voters have never been overly bound by taste.

Copied

Jason P. Frank Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:03 PM EST

How does Conan transition out of this Ari-Cynthia opening performance?

Ariana did “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” while Cynthia followed with “Home” from The Wiz.

Copied

Bailey Kircher Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 7:00 PM EST

Julianne Hough screaming into a tiny mic making Timmy uncomfortable

Down with tiny mics!!!

Copied

Zoë Haylock Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 6:57 PM EST

Lily-Rose Depp is dressed like her ex is up for an Oscar, I have to respect it

Photo: Kevin Mazur/Getty Images

Copied

Roxana Hadadi Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 6:53 PM EST

I love how RED Colman Domingo’s look is

Photo: Getty Images

Copied

Alejandra Gularte Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 6:50 PM EST

Just realized Timmy is embodying the KitchenAid color of the year …

BUTTER.

Copied

Dee Lockett Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 6:49 PM EST

Guy Pearce is wearing a ‘Free Palestine’ pin

Swoon.

Copied

Alison Willmore Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 6:43 PM EST

I wonder if Margaret Qualley’s dress is intentionally evoking the low-backed gown Demi Moore wears at the bar in The Substance

Photo: Penske Media via Getty Images

Photo: Working Title Films

Copied

Jason P. Frank Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 6:39 PM EST

Emma Stone looks more like an Oscar winner this year

Than she did last year, when she wore a silly Louis Vuitton outfit that burst at the seams — and then landed Best Actress for Poor Things. In many ways, it makes sense: She didn’t expect to get onstage last year (everyone expected Lily Gladstone to win for Killers of the Flower Moon), and this year, Stone knows she’s presenting Best Actor. Still: sad!

Photo: Penske Media via Getty Images

Copied

Fran Hoepfner Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 6:28 PM EST

The first GlamBOTs are hitting the feed

Elle Fanning, Ethan Slater, and Matt and Bowen. If we must endure them, I’d like to see more duos tackle the GlamBOT together: Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande, Jeremy Strong and Kieran Culkin, Brady Corbet and Sean Baker.

Copied

Joe Reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 6:27 PM EST

Happy 11th Oscar anniversary, Ellen’s Cursed Group Photo!

Photo: Getty Images

March 2nd, 2014 is a day that will live in Oscar infamy. Host Ellen Degeneres, in a show of force that one assumed was meant to intimidate any future Oscar emcees, declared her intention to set the world record for most retweets on Twitter, and to that end called to heel ten of Hollywood’s top stars to assemble for a selfie. Assemble they did — Brad Pitt, Meryl Streep, Julia Roberts, Bradley Cooper, Channing Tatum, Jennifer Lawrence, Kevin Spacey, Angelina Jolie, and two of that night’s newly minted Oscar winners, Jared Leto and Lupita Nyong’o — in what remains one of the more cursed totems in Academy Awards history. Within a decade, both Spacey and Ellen would be canceled, Pitt and Jolie’s marriage would end in deeply ugly fashion, Tatum and Lawrence would be debased in various ways by the X-Men film franchise, Streep would be exiled to the cold wasteland of television, Jared Leto would portray the Joker so off-puttingly that it helped kill an entire wave of DC superhero films, and Bradley Cooper would proceed to get infinitesimally weirder each day, until one day he made Maestro.

Even the photo itself looks haunted: Julia Roberts’ floating head and all-devouring grin; Kevin Spacey jump-scaring into the background, probably directly from the depths of hell; Jared Leto’s one intense eye; Angelina obscuring her own face. Thank goodness for Peter Nyong’o, an oasis of unblemished normalcy amid this tableau of the soul-sucking nature of fame, where A-List stature damns you to an eternity of assembling at the whim of a mom-dancing talk-show host who everybody in the room knows is mean but nobody will say anything about it for another six years.

Anyway, eleven years! A lot’s happened since then, huh?

Copied

Zoë Haylock Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 6:15 PM EST

Timothée’s wearing a winner’s look

Photo: AFP via Getty Images

Copied

Hershal Pandya Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 6:12 PM EST

Who is going to be the brave soul that interviews Karla Sofía Gascón on the red carpet?

Copied

Kathryn VanArendonk Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 6:10 PM EST

Just landed in L.A. for non-Oscars reasons

Got in a cab and told the guy the address and he said, “Hollywood?! Oh my God.” Then he said “I will see what we can do” and it sounded like he was planning a heist.

Copied

Joe Reid Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 5:57 PM EST

Happy 81st Oscar anniversary to Casablanca

March 2, 1944 was a landmark Oscar day for a few reasons, but the one remembered best now, 81 years later, is that the legendary Casablanca won the award for Best Picture. Oscar history tends to be speckled with the blemishes of legendary films that somehow didn’t win BP: Just two years prior to Casablanca’s triumph, Citizen Kane infamously lost to How Green Was My Valley. Around the World in 80 Days bested Giant, The King and I, and The Ten Commandments in 1956. Driving Miss Daisy won over the unnominated Do the Right Thing in ’89. On the most recent AFI list of the best American films of all time, only half of the top ten were Best Picture winners.

So a win for Casablanca wasn’t just a win for director Michael Curtiz or for Warner Bros.; it was a win for Oscar history. According to Inside Oscar, that year’s ceremony was also the first to take place in a theater — Hollywood’s famed Grauman’s Chinese Theater — and not as part of a banquet. They were also the first Oscars to be attended by people outside of the film industry, as the Academy gave passes to 200 members of the armed forces. (Both of these suggestions were reportedly made by actress Bette Davis.) They were even the first Oscars, way back in 1944, to make a big deal about nominees keeping their speeches short, allotting a mere 30 seconds to each winner. The event lasted a shade under two hours.

Copied

Alejandra Gularte Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 5:49 PM EST

June Squibb summer incoming

Copied

Alison Willmore Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 5:48 PM EST

Cynthia’s look at least brings the drama

Photo: Penske Media via Getty Images

Copied

Alison Willmore Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 5:46 PM EST

Ariana Grande and Elle Fanning look like a too tastefully remodeled townhouse in these colors

Photo: Getty Images

Copied

Alison Willmore Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 5:44 PM EST

I’m tired of Ari’s Glindacore phase

I appreciate some theme dressing, especially when the arc of a publicity campaign is long and full of photocalls. But there are only so many variations on fairy-princess fashion anyone can wear in a season before starting to give off the aura of a very high-end children’s birthday party entertainer. The frills, the poofs, the pinks — I can’t handle a whole other press cycle of these looks! Free Ariana: For Good.

Photo: Getty Images

Copied

Josef Adalian Updated Mar. 2, 2025, 5:41 PM EST

It’s never been easier to stream an Oscars ceremony

In past years, you needed to shell out $70-plus for the Hulu with Live TV service (or something similar like YouTube TV, DirecTV Stream or a cable login) in order to steam the Oscars. This year, the Oscars will be available to all Hulu subscribers regardless of their subscription tier, including the entry-level $9.99 Hulu with Ads plan.

Sign Up for the Vulture Newsletter

The latest in pop-culture news, recaps, and reviews, plus interviews, profiles, and more.