Oscars 2024: Actors strike over. Bring on the bedlam — and the cherries jubilee

An hour into the posh cocktail party that Warner Bros. hosted for Greta Gerwig a couple of weeks ago, the sun was setting, the Wagyu beef sliders were cooling and the view of L.A. was turning golden. Gerwig was off in a corner of Harriet’s Rooftop, a bar atop West Hollywood’s 1 Hotel, laughing with Billie Eilish and Dua Lipa, while her husband, filmmaker and “Barbie” co-writer Noah Baumbach, smiled wanly and tried to look like he was enjoying himself.

And maybe he was. The cheery evening was ostensibly a celebration of Gerwig’s selection as guest artistic director at AFI Fest, though in reality it was part of the beginning of what promises to be an epic awards season push for “Barbie.” Not that you’d know it from the surroundings. The only fuchsia on display was musician Mark Ronson (who co-wrote and co-produced five “Barbie” songs and co-wrote the film’s score) sporting a vintage pink Led Zeppelin T-shirt under his navy jacket. Near him, Jay Roach and Susanna Hoffs (married for 30 years!) talked Beatles; Judd Apatow solicited movie recommendations.

The only thing missing? Actors. But now that SAG-AFTRA and the studios have reached a tentative agreement to end the long, costly work stoppage, Warner Bros. could very well throw another party, this time with the magic hour providing the perfectly lit, hazy shade of winter ambience for stars Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling to mingle and boost the voter turnout.

With both the holidays and awards season nomination voting fast approaching, the SAG-AFTRA settlement has unleashed a backlog of pent-up personal appearances for actors from movies that opened during the strike and those with projects now arriving in the usual year-end crush. Minutes after the settlement, studios began scrambling to stage and revise events to include members of their acting ensembles. For instance, Focus Features’ holiday-themed “cherries jubilee” event for “The Holdovers” immediately added actors Paul Giamatti, Da’Vine Joy Randolph and Dominic Sessa.

And, three weeks after its theatrical premiere, Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon” finally staged its film academy screening in Beverly Hills with cast members Leonardo DiCaprio and Lily Gladstone joining the director onstage after the 3½-hour movie ended. (Scorsese, of course, received the loudest ovation from the 430 people attending.)

For actors with movies and awards campaigns to push, the strike settlement was a case of good news, bad news.

The good news? They could go out and promote work that they’re proud of.

The bad news? They could go out and promote work that they’re proud of.

“As much as they like talking about themselves, most actors don’t particularly enjoy doing interviews,” one personal publicist notes. “But they want to keep working, and it’s part of the job.”

The main beneficiaries — besides late-night talk show talent bookers and the private jet companies that will be flying stars to appearances (per their nonnegotiable demands) — are the up-and-coming actors and the veterans with roles of a lifetime who can now promote work that might change the trajectory of their careers. (And, yes, eventually grant them private-jet privileges.)

“The Holdovers,” Alexander Payne’s bittersweet comedy about a trio of lonely people stranded at an all-boys boarding school over the holidays, has one of each. It’s Sessa’s film debut, and he makes the most of it playing a troubled, smart-mouthed student who isn’t old enough to eat cherries jubilee at a restaurant. And Randolph’s dramatic portrayal of a grieving mother has expanded audiences’ notions about what she can do. She’s a leading contender, at this early stage, for the supporting actress Oscar. So why wouldn’t she be excited to share a flambéed dessert with a bunch of complete strangers who could potentially help her career?

Aside from the Writers Guild moving its ceremony until after the Oscars — a shift no one understands — the awards season calendar hasn’t changed. It has just compressed, creating an environment that Oscar consultants describe, voices tinged with dread, as “pandemonium,” “bedlam” and a “mad f— dash to the finish.”

“It’s going to be like a bad game of duck, duck, goose,” one Oscar consultant says, describing the challenge ahead to entice voters in a time that will be crowded with holiday parties and actors and movies vying for attention. Yes, we are detailing first-world problems. We are also describing, in the words of another awards specialist, a situation that has already turned into a “veritable ‘Lord of the Flies.’”

“The holidays can’t come soon enough,” one talent booker told us.

The SAG Awards made a couple of small changes to its voting windows and boosted the number of screening slots for members of its nominating committees. Screenings now start as early as 9 a.m., slots that are no one’s first choice because who wants to schlep across town at that early hour? (And that was before the arson fire that broke the 10 Freeway.) The SAG Awards nominations will still be announced Jan. 10, with the ceremony set for Feb. 24.

“I don’t think people are all that far behind on their viewing,” one consultant says, “because, remember, the strikes shut down the town. People had time on their hands to go see movies. What else were they going to do? Stay home and have dinner with their families?”

Not when there’s a free post-screening buffet reception right across town. (We’re still trying to forget the party where we saw a voter dump a plate of sliders into her leather bag.) So, yes, pandemonium ... but a good tumult. It has been an exceptional year for movies, and having stars like DiCaprio, Emma Stone (“Poor Things”) and Bradley Cooper (“Maestro”) go out and promote them will help stoke interest, sell tickets and prod studios to, hopefully, keep making ambitious, original movies.

Bring on the bedlam. (And the cherries jubilee.)