ABC needs boost from the Oscars and it’s counting on Chris Rock, writes Hal Boedeker.
The Oscar telecast tonight will not be a challenge just for host Chris Rock and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
ABC has a lot riding on the big show, its most-watched telecast each year. The awards show is usually the highest-rated entertainment program in all of television, although it can’t compare to the Super Bowl’s drawing power.
Disney-owned ABC, which is fourth in young-adult viewers, needs an Oscar boost badly. ABC needs Rock to deliver an opening monologue — the show starts at 8:30 — that hooks viewers.
Rock is expected to address the absence of any acting nominees of color, a controversy that has overshadowed Hollywood’s big night.
Rock’s challenge: Make a serious point in a forum that can be silly, self-congratulatory, lavish and out of touch. The academy has sued over Oscar gift bags valued this
year at $232,000 each.
Despite the furor, black performers will be represented by Oscar winners Morgan Freeman, Whoopi Goldberg, Louis Gossett Jr., Common, John Legend and Quincy Jones. The presenters include Kerry Washington, Kevin Hart, Michael B. Jordan, The Weeknd and Pharrell Williams.
The presenter lineup also includes Oscar winners Eddie Redmayne, Julianne Moore, J.K. Simmons, Patricia Arquette, Cate Blanchett, Russell Crowe, Benicio del Toro, Jared Leto, Charlize Theron and Reese Witherspoon.
Beyond the awards, ABC will use the Oscars to promote upcoming series. The most promising seems to be “The Real O’Neals,” a tart sitcom about a family that drops the pretense of trying to be perfect. The show, featuring Martha Plimpton as mom, starts at 8:30 and 9:30 p.m. Wednesday, sandwiching “Modern Family.”
“The Family,” a dark drama about a political family and a kidnapped son, debuts at 9 p.m. Thursday after “Grey’s Anatomy,” then shifts to the brutal 9 p.m. Sunday slot. The biblical drama “Of Prophets and Kings” arrives March 8. “The Catch,” a drama from “Scandal” producer Shonda Rhimes, debuts March 24.
The biggest return may be “Dancing With the Stars.” Still ABC’s most-watched series, it begins a new season March 21. “Dancing” rarely wins prizes, but it knows how to draw a crowd, a skill ABC desperately needs.