After the most drawn-out Oscar season ever, the show
finally went on. The scaled-down pandemic edition of the 93rd Academy Awards proved to be an emotional affair despite the need for such safety measures as multiple Covid tests and social distancing. The usual glitz and glitter were slightly dimmed while the red carpet was a six-feet-apart affair, with masks not required when participants were on camera.
Oscar producer Steven Soderbergh—who ironically directed 2011’s “Contagion,” about a rapidly spreading virus—and his partners promised a host-less intimate experience with no Zooming allowed, one that would unfold like a movie at two venues: The Art Deco-bedecked Union Station and Oscar’s usual home, Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre, where the audience at any time was kept at 170 instead of the usual 3,400 attendees. Soderbergh also encouraged acceptance speeches to be personal and more expansive. Those winners not in L.A. were captured by remote satellite. But the atmosphere in the train station felt more like a cool, cozy lounge where the in-crowd hangs out.