***Live Wire*** 93rd Academy Awards: Train Station Oscars -- No Host, Semi-Masked, Will World Even Watch?

The 93rd annual Academy Awards ceremony kicks off Sunday night at 8 p.m. Eastern on ABC from the Dolby Theater and Union Station in Los Angeles, California. But will anyone care enough to tune in?

Left-wing Hollywood has turned the once beloved annual ritual into a hectoring lecture on diversity and left-wing politics. Celebrities line up to insult half the country. And A-list elites drone on about climate change even though many of them flew private jets to appear at the ceremony.

Making matters worse, this year’s nominees have the lowest level of audience awareness of any Oscars ceremony in recent memory. Millions of viewers will not have seen or even heard of Nomadland, Minari, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, or Sound of Metal. The level of enthusiasm is so low that ABC has reportedly slashed commercial rates for what is normally an evening that rivals the Super Bowl in terms of ad buys.

Taken to task for failing to live up to the woke mob’s inclusion standards, the shift in nominated films has been pronounced.

Writing in The Guardian, writer and television producer David Cox summed it up thusly:

It is only six years since the #OscarsSoWhite uproar. Now, however, of 20 acting nominees, nine are people of colour; most of the candidates for best actor are not white. Two women have been recognised in the best director category for the first time.

The best picture list boasts a feminist parable in the shape of Promising Young Woman, a Black rallying cry in Judas and the Black Messiah, a salute to immigrants in Minari, a story of minority ethnic disability in Sound of Metal and an anti-establishment carnival in The Trial of the Chicago 7. Ranged against these are Mank – which, as a clever-clever feast of Hollywood self-love, might have been the favourite in days of yore – and The Father, an all-white, male-dominated exercise in value-free virtuosity.

And organizers are bracing for the worst. The Golden Globes saw its ratings plummet by 60 percent while the Grammys experienced a close to 50 percent drop off in viewers. Ratings for the Oscars have been in free fall for the past decade, with last year’s show drawing just 23.6 million viewers, down by half since 2000.

Still, producers are promising an exciting show with no Zoom acceptance speeches or masked presenters. What a COVID-compliant Oscars will look like remains to be seen. With director Steven Soderbergh at the helm, it could have energy and pizazz like Ocean’s Eleven. Or it could end up being weird and alienating like most of his movies in the past decade.

Like last year, there will be no Oscars host thanks to the cancel culture that has turned it into a job no one wants. Who in their right mind would want their name attached to what is likely to be the lowest rated Oscars in history?

Follow along with Breitbart News right here for live updates, including fashion commentary from Breitbart’s own John Binder.

All times Eastern. Latest updates at the top.

11:18 p.m. — That’s a wrap.

After the Oscars coverage should be fun, including the ratings for this year’s Academy Awards telecast which should drop by lunchtime on Monday.

11:16 p.m. — Winner: Anthony Hopkins wins best actor for The Father.
11:15 p.m. — Glenn Close twerking has been topped by Frances McDormand howling like a wolf.

Watch below:

11:12 p.m. — Winner: Frances McDormand wins Best Actress for her role in Nomadland.
11:06 p.m. — Nomadland snagging the top award of the night should comes as a surprise to no one. It came in the favorite and is performing as such.

11:06 p.m. — Winner: Nomadland wins Best Picture.

10:45 p.m. — The show has gone all the way off the rails. Get Out star and comedian Lil Rel Howery stepped in to host what felt like an impromptu and nonetheless wild Oscars music trivia. Actress Glenn Close got up to shake her butt to the 1988 hit “Da Butt.”

Watch below:

10:40 p.m. — Winner: H.E.R.’s Fight For You from #JudasAndTheBlackMessiah wins best original song

10:34 p.m. — Winner: Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross and Jon Batiste win Best Original Score for Soul

10:26 p.m. — “Meet me in the middle and refuse hate,” the touchstone of Perry’s passionate speech. “”I refuse to hate someone because they are Mexican or because they are Black or white or LBGTQ. I refuse to hate someone because they are a police officer. I refuse to hate someone because they are Asian.”
Watch below:

10:25 p.m. — Winner: The second Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award of the night goes to Tyler Perry.

10:19 p.m. — Mikkel E. G. Nielsen wins Best Film Editing for Sound of Metal

10:10 p.m. — Winner: Erik Messerschmidt wins Best Cinematography for Mank.

10:06 p.m. — Winner: Mank wins Best Production Design.

9:58 p.m. — Youn’s speech is by far the warmest, funniest, most charming, and gracious speech of the night. Treat yourself.

Watch below:

9:54 p.m. — Winner: Yuh-Jung Youn wins Best Supporting Actress for her role in Minari.

9:52 p.m. — Winner: Tenet wins Best Visual Effects.

9:42 p.m. — Winner: My Octopus Teacher wins Best Documentary.
9:35 p.m. — Winner: Colette wins Best Documentary (Short Subject).

9:26 p.m. — Winner: Soul wins Best Animated Feature Film.

9:23 p.m. — Best Animated Short Film producer, actor Will McCormack launched into a political charged diatribe while accepting the award.

Watch below:

9:21 p.m. — Winner: If Anything Happens I Love You wins Best Animated Short Film.

9:15 p.m. — Two Distant Strangers writer-director Travon Free launched into an anti-police rant from the stage. “Today, the police will kill three people. And tomorrow, the police will kill three people. And the day after that, the police will kill three people. Because on average the police in America everyday kill about three people,” Free said. “Which amounts to about a thousand people a years. And those people happen to be disproportionately black people.”

“James Baldwin once said, ‘The most despicable thing a person can be is indifferent to other people’s pain’…Please, don’t be indifferent to our pain,” Free said.

Watch below:

9:13 p.m. — Winner: Two Distant Strangers wins Best live Action Short Film.

9:11 p.m. — Ahmed is back to present the award for Best Live Action Short Film.

9:08 p.m. — Winner: Sound of Metal wins Best Sound.

9:07 p.m. — Actor and Sound of Metal star Riz Ahmed takes the stage to present the award for Best Sound.

9:00 p.m. — Not a huge surprise here. Interestingly, though? Zhao’s Nomadland is estimated to be the lowest grossing Best Picture ever — with an estimated $2.5 million at the box office cume — since Kathryn Bigelow’s 2009 Iraq War drama The Hurt Locker, which boasts a domestic haul of just $17 million.

9:00 p.m. While Zhao’s film has been characterized as a wet kiss to middle America with not-so-subtle winks to MAGA country, her speech wasn’t political but, as author Gordon Chang says, was about faith and humanity.

Watch below:

9:00 p.m. — Winner: Chloé Zhao wins Best Directing for Nomadland.

8:49 p.m. — The first major moment to spotlight the coronavirus pandemic came nearly an hour into the show, with Breaking Bad star Bryan Cranston presenting the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award. Cranston walked through the Dolby Theatre, which was filled with to present the award to the Motion Picture & Television Fund.

8:45 p.m. — Winner: Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom wins Best Costume Design.

8:44 p.m. — Cheadle is back to present the winner for Best Costume Design.

8:42 p.m. — Winner Mia Neal delivered an emotional speech, saying “”I can picture Black trans women standing up here. And Asian sisters. And our Latina sisters. And indigenous women. And I know that one day it won’t be unusual or groundbreaking.”

Watch below:

8:42 p.m. — Winner: Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom wins Best Makeup and Hairstyling.

8:40 p.m. — Actor Don Cheadle takes the stage to present the Oscar for Best Makeup and Hairstyling.

8:34 p.m. — The Get Out and Black Panther star Daniel Kaluuya heaped praised on Black Panther Party members Fred Hampton and its co-founders Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale. In his disjointed acceptance speech Keluuya also said “It’s incredible. My mom. My dad. They had sex. It’s amazing!”

Watch below:

8:30 p.m. — Winner: Daniel Kaluuya wins Best Supporting Actor for his role as Black Panther Party leader Fred Hampton in Judas And The Black Messiah

8:27 p.m. — Dern comes back to present the award for Best Supporting Actor.
8:22 p.m. — Winner: Another Round wins Best International Feature Film.

8:18 p.m. — Actress Laura Dern takes the stage to present the award for Best International Feature Film

8:12 p.m. — Winner: Christopher Hampton and Florian Zeller win Best Adapted Screenplay for The Father

8:08 p.m. — Winner: Emerald Fennell wins Best Original Screenplay for Promising Young Woman

8:02 p.m. — Two minutes. It only took a couple minutes before politics took center stage.

Actress-director Regina King “I have to be honest. If things had gone differently this past week in Minneapolis, I might’ve traded in my heels for marching boots,” Regina King said of the Derek Chauvin verdict. “Now, I know that a lot of you people at home want to reach for you remote when you feel like Hollywood is preaching to you. But as the mother of a black son, I know the fear that so many live with. And no amount of fame or fortune changes that. Ok?”

Watch below:

8:00 p.m. – Showtime

7:39 p.m. — Why is this dress eating Amanda Seyfried? She’s nominated for Best Supporting Actress for Mank.

7:31 p.m. — There’s definitely a running theme on the red carpet tonight, the 1980s are back in full swing and Angela Bassett is wearing poof sleeves in the most modern way possible.

7:05 p.m. — There’s a lovely ballerina quality to Maria Bakalova’s gown tonight. Perhaps in a different color, this would have been a home run.

7:05 p.m. — Glenn Close seems to want to remind us that she’s been nominated for Oscars since 1983 (and, wrongfully, never won) with this heavily 80s-inspired Armani tunic, pants, and glove combo.

7:01 p.m. — Viola Davis, nominated for Best Actress for Ma Rainy’s Black Bottom, couldn’t have chosen a better color to wear on Oscar night. This look whispers elegance.

7:01 p.m. — It was only a matter of minutes before someone walked in wearing the latest Gucci runway collection. Before anyone’s even been photographed wearing these pieces, it feels … tired.

6:58 p.m. — This gold ball gown on Carey Mulligan, nominated for Best Actress for Promising Young Women, seems overwhelming for her small frame but maybe in motion, it is something to behold.

6:46 p.m. — LaKeith Stanfield, nominated for Best Supporting Actor for Judis and the Black Messiah, harks back to the early days of Yves Saint Laurent in this custom Saint Laurent suit. We’re long overdue for long collars to make a comeback!

6:45 p.m. — John Binder Fashion Update — Regina King is channeling Joan Collins in Dynasty with this custom Louis Vuitton gown in baby blue.