The 8 Oscars night moments you need to see (and where to see them)

So, the Oscars went pretty well, all in all. The right envelopes were opened, most of the jokes landed and crucially, no one got punched. It was handled by Jimmy Kimmel with his customary mix of confidence and gentle, piss-taking chutzpah, albeit without the calibre of material of his previous hosting gigs. If the awards went to the predicted winners, no one was grumbling too much about that – Lily Gladstone’s disappointing loss in the Best Actress category aside.

In fact, the show felt like a straightforward win after many tricky years. Plenty of moments landed brilliantly, both in the room and with TV audiences around the world. Whether the Oscars can become a ratings juggernaut again is doubtful, but more nights like this will give it a fighting chance. Here’s what we loved about the night – and a couple of things we didn’t.

1. Ryan Gosling’s Kenergy

Baby Goose was arguably the night’s MVP, the Oppenheimer crew aside. Few have combined loosey-goosey charm with A-list charisma like Gosling since prime Brad Pitt – and the Barbie star is multiples funnier. The Oscars organisers – and ABC camera crews – leant into those qualities at regular intervals. An entertainingly catty Barbie vs Oppenheimer on-stage exchange with Emily Blunt served as a precursor for the night’s grandstand moment: a rendition of ‘I’m Just Ken’ that riffed on Gentlemen Prefers Blondes’ ‘Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend’ sequence and ended with Slash, Mark Ronson and about 300 Kens on stage and most of the audience cutting loose. Magnificent doesn’t cover it. 

2. Emma Stone’s sudden sprint 

The closest the night came to a shock was Lily Gladstone missing out on Best Actress for Killers of the Flower Moon. Leaving aside the rights and wrongs of that one – and we’re in the ‘wrong’ camp – Emma Stone’s livewire turn in Poor Things was still a worthy winner. Her livewire turn at Oscars night was plenty entertaining too. Stone was having a ball throughout, none more so than when she was caught mouthing something less than flattering about Kimmel after he took a shot at Poor Things and when she made a Ralph-Fiennes-in-Grand-Budapest-Hotel-style dash back to her seat to see the movie win another award. She brought the kind of chaos energy the Oscars have been missing since Jennifer Lawrence’s last nomination.

3. Jonathan Glazer’s plea for peace

This gathering of designer-clad millionaires celebrating themselves starts from a place of looking insular and self-congratulatory and has to work to escape those perceptions. A few rousing, socially-conscious speeches tackling bigger, thornier issues go a long way to helping with that. Enter Jonathan Glazer, who accepted the Best International Film Oscar by drawing a direct thread between The Zone of Interest and the current occupation of Gaza by Israel. It was a subject no one else dared approach – aside from the pro-Palestine protest that threatened to hold up the ceremony outside – and that it came from a Jewish filmmaker who’d just made one of the definitive movies about the Holocaust made it all the more powerful.

4. The surprise Twins reunion 

Danny DeVito and Arnold Schwarzenegger were reunited for the, erm, 36th (?) anniversary of ’80s comedy Twins. Quickly, though, it turned into a get-together of villains from the Tim Burton Batman movies, especially when they clocked the Dark Knight himself, Michael Keaton, in the audience. The look on Keaton’s face was of a man thinking of dusting off his Batarang.  

5. John Mulaney explains Field of Dreams

In a strong audition for a future hosting role – and the Academy could do so, so much worse – SNL mainstay John Mulaney popped up to present Best Sound. Instead, via the most tenuous of segues, he delivered an inspired explanation of Field of Dreams that ended with a full breakdown of the rules of ghost baseball. Give this man the mic next year.

6. John Cena letting it all hang out

This Oscars night felt nicely plugged into Academy Awards history, with a balance of freshness and a sense of heritage running through the night. In a callback to the streaker who interrupted David Niven on stage in 1974, John Cena appeared stark naked to present the Best Costume Design award. At least, he was supposed to before getting cold feet and refusing to come on stage. As bits go, it was a lot of fun, Cena’s comic timing selling the silliness. Watching the stacked wrestler-turned-actor scuttling across the stage with the nominees’ envelope protecting his modesty was a highlight. ‘Costumes are so important,’ he told the audience, intro’ing the award. ‘Maybe the most important thing there is.’

7. Nicolas Cage being Nicolas Cage

Advice to all Oscars producers: if you can get Nicolas Cage into the show, get Nicolas Cage into the show.

8. Messi being the new Lassi (again)

Messi, the pooch from Anatomy of a Fall, has won Hollywood’s hearts over awards season, glad-pawing Tinseltown with the ease and assurance of a veteran. Thanks to editing trickery and years of training, there were cutaways to Messi clapping during some of the awards. Is there nothing this dog cannot do? 

And two lowlights...

The RDJ cocaine joke

Jimmy Kimmel is normally Hollywood’s safest pair of hands, but even the safest hands drop the odd can of corn. His opening monologue, and some of his subsequent gags, played like a bingo card of lazy Oscars jokes. There were jabs at Ozempic use, animation being for kids, and – sigh – the length of movies. Some of the jokes were quite random – ‘I haven’t seen a French actor eat vomit like that since Gérard Depardieu,’ he said of Anatomy of a Fall’s pooch Messi – and his riff on Robert Downey Jr’s past struggles with drugs was just awkward for all concerned. In fairness, he was a very solid link man, and many of the mid-show bits, like Cena’s naked cameo, benefited from his timing and charm. And we’d still take him over many other recent hosts.

Another Best Picture envelope fumble

Everyone in Hollywood – and elsewhere – loves Al Pacino and he seemed like a natural choice to announce the Best Picture winner. But he let slip the winner’s name almost accidentally and without any of the ‘ho-ha!’-ing fanfare you’d expect from the great man – and that surely the Academy had hoped for. It wasn’t anywhere near La La Land and Moonlight mishap in awkwardness, but it was still a moment of anticlimax at the sharp end of the night.

Time Out watched the Oscars at the Pullman London St Pancras hotel.

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