Monday, March 06, 2006

Didn't Work the Oscars this Year

Oscar Stagehands - Head Carpenter Tom Yokas at the Academy Awards
I thought it was a good one. We love Jon Stewart. I love it when Hollywood gets political. Hollywood should stand up and point out that being "out of touch" is a very good thing. Giving an Oscar to a black woman when people in red states wouldn't give her a seat on a bus is a good thing. Making movies about gay men so afraid to show it because they'll be killed, that's a good thing too. To my ears, the people saying gays shouldn't marry sound just like people who wanted to stone Sidney Potier for making a movie about mixed race dating. George Clooney is right. If George Bush is in touch, I'll stay out.

Watching the show tonight, I remembered all the Oscars I worked, from Tom Hanks telling jokes to the orchestra when I was doing pit microphones, to my first Oscar, when I was doing the light for the balcony statue they use going to and back from commercial. I have to admit, with the car on fire and the big screen during Itzhak Perlman, the show was, from a stagehand point of view, a good one as well. Hats off to my IATSE Local 33 brothers who are the Oscar stagehands.