Taming the Carnival Atmosphere of the Oscar Telecast

The Academy Award-winning “A Beautiful Mind” is not the only artistic endeavor whose integrity has been viciously under attack by rivals this Oscar season.

This review--inspired by Sunday night’s Academy Awards telecast on ABC--is already being accused by other TV critics of being fatally flawed by omissions, distortions and untruths.

These critics fail to understand that extreme literary license is essential not only to sustain reader interest, but to achieve a truth greater than mere literal truth, honesty and accuracy. How mundane those are. What follows, instead, is a review not of the Oscarcast, but of something much more significant that Oscar-winning “A Beautiful Mind” director Ron Howard will surely appreciate.

My personal vision of the Oscarcast.

It begins with high praise for Billy Crystal as host. The timing, the creativity. And funneeeeee? When he descended from the top of New York’s Madison Square Garden in that balloon....

All right, instead of the reliably witty Crystal, it was a return gig for Whoopi Goldberg, dropping down on a swing from the top of the Oscar event’s impressive new Hollywood home, Kodak Theatre, in trashy feathers worthy of Bette Midler in her Divine Miss M days.

“Security here tonight is tighter than some of the faces,” said Goldberg, who did nothing thereafter to match the fun spectacle of her opening, but was funny from time to time and set a pleasant tone for a crisp, sometimes moving show directed by Louis J. Horvitz and produced by Laura Ziskin. Yet whoever created the cheap John Ashcroft joke should have stowed it.

The show’s highlight, aside from the awards, was an appearance by Hollywood’s favorite New Yorker, Woody Allen, pitching his Sept. 11-scarred city for film production in conjunction with a montage of movies set there.

Well, it was a kick seeing Allen in Hollywood, a place he so famously dislikes. Still, the highlights were elsewhere. One was a performance by the animal-less Cirque du Soleil circus troupe, the other a special Oscar for granted a deserving Sidney Poitier.

The circus performers were spectacular in this setting in conjunction with introducing the award for effects. It was an extraordinarily visual moment, and the appearance of Poitier an extraordinarily emotional one. Unlike some of his giddy fellow actors, he was the picture of dignity while accepting an award signifying his seminal role in breaking barriers holding back African Americans in the film industry. It was all the more memorable, given the evening’s breakthrough Oscar wins by Halle Berry and Denzel Washington.

Poitier is “not just an African American treasure, [he’s] an American treasure,” noted Berry. That being the case, however, why have only black performers take part in the tribute?

Posting Donald Sutherland and Glenn Close backstage as sub-anchors was a terrific idea.

Actually, not. Talk about redundancies.

Cleo Lipschultz electrified the audience when singing the five original song nominees.

In truth, there was no Cleo Lipschultz. She’s a composite character I created because the real names of the five singers would confuse you. In any case, the song nominees were again the draggiest part of the evening.

The pre-telecast, celebrities-walk-the-red-carpet shows finally rose to the occasion, attaining levels of intelligence and sincerity worthy of the event they they’re supposed to be celebrating.

Oh, sure. On the E! Entertainment channel, that old pro Joan Rivers was at it again, asking “Sexy Beast” nominee Ben Kingsley: “How do they know to give you such a variety of parts?” His reply to the unanswerable question: “There’s a beast in all of us.”

On KTLA, a question to “Gosford Park” nominee Helen Mirren: “Is it gratifying to be recognized for a role like that?” Duh! Mirren reckoned that it was.

On ABC’s pre-show, co-host Chris Connelly had “Black Hawk Down” star Josh Hartnett in his cross hairs, grilling him mercilessly about his nominated director, Ridley Scott: “Are you hoping he wins tonight?” Hartnett admitted he was. And then to nominees Nicole Kidman and Renee Zellweger: “Are you worried about sweating in your new gowns?”

At least Rivers ended with a self-effacing sendup of her own show, bidding viewers a maudlin farewell (“Goodbye, my friends ... “) before adding, as if unaware she was still on camera: “Who wrote this crap?”

It must have been the beast in her.

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Howard Rosenberg’s column appears Mondays and Fridays.