Emma Stone wasn’t thrown by her Oscar tribute
Q: After the Oscars, much was made of the fact that Emma Stone and Jennifer Lawrence are close friends. Why, then, did Sally Field do the tribute to Emma Stone on the show instead? – Casey Grimes, via e-mail
A: In gathering past winners of the acting categories to present this year’s awards, the producers tried to play up connections between performers who had worked together, and Field played Aunt May in the two “Amazing Spider-Man” movies that featured Stone as Gwen Stacy. Thus, she could speak to Stone’s professional acumen on the set. As photos taken after the presentation showed, Stone had plenty of time to commiserate with Lawrence as the evening went on, with Stone firmly grasping her second Oscar for best actress. She won that for “Poor Things,” while her first one had been for 2016’s “La La Land” — which also starred Ryan Gosling, whose Oscar-show rendering of the “Barbie” tune “I’m Just Ken” was pegged by Stone as the likely reason she “broke” her dress by singing and dancing energetically before she took the stage.
Q: Why did so many shows go into reruns so soon after their new seasons started? – Barry Kahn, Colorado Springs, Colo.
A: Actually, the great bulk of scripted broadcast-network series typically air repeats as spring nears, but it may have seemed more pronounced this time because of the late start the television season got. Last year’s entertainment-industry strikes kept most shows from running new episodes until this past January, February or March, and with the impact on production, presenting some reruns gave the shows some leeway to catch up on their schedules for making stories for the remainder of the season. By the same token, networks like to have their shows stay as fresh as possible until the traditional television season ends in May, so mixing in some repeats allows for the season’s last new episode to be held until that general time frame. Because of the strike-related delay, series that normally would generate 22 episodes per season only have had an average of 10 or 12 this time, so that cutdown has largely dictated what the networks have needed to do.