The Movies are Dying

By Lara Connor '22

Joan River’s laugh reverberated off of Mom’s white bedroom walls. Her show, Fashion Police, boasted a 6/10 IMDb rating against a 72% audience satisfaction rate. If she had one fan left on this planet, it was seven-year-old me. Joan used the word “ass.” She roasted sequins decisions and knee-high slits on a spit. I was enthralled. Critiques of body shapes, sizes, hairdos, and fanciful rumors filled my little ears. The convenient excuse to indulge in the show was that my Mom worked in fashion media at the time and wrote down who wore what on a notepad. I wrote down new words. “I can’t believe I’m letting you watch this,” Mom whispered to herself, “this show is ridiculous.” Since I was under the covers by bedtime, before the champagne was poured inside the Dolby Theatre, fashion was all I knew about awards shows.

By 2018, I understood what there was to love about the Oscars beyond hemlines and bustiers. It encouraged the magic of old Hollywood. It rewarded the same innovation that brought our society Star Wars and our screens young Leo in decades past. I waxed and waned over whether Frances McDormand's fiery performance in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri would edge out Meryl Streep’s stoic yet unsurprisingly transformative trip as Kay Graham in The Post. I wasn’t surprised when Frances took it home, but instead paused by Mom’s assertion as the actress wrapped her acceptance speech: “It’s a shame she wore that dress. It’s all anyone will talk about.” I had barely yet noticed that Frances had indeed worn a burlap sack to the red carpet, but could now hear the cruel cackle of the late Joan Rivers reverberate from somewhere far off in my television's speakers.
 
No one really cares about the fashion, especially Joan. The fashion was an old means to compare and critique celebrities beyond their personas. Soon people critiqued reactions on cameras, the unimportant hug you give your wife when you win, and many more aspects of celebrity. This environment of criticism peaked when more people watched a YouTube clip of poor Warren Beatty err Best Picture announcement than they did The Oscars itself, and Awards Shows officially succumb to their last legs of character.
 
This past March, they fell.
 
When Will Smith strode up onto the Oscars stage and gave Chris Rock a taste of his metacarpals, conversations throbbed about “what Hollywood has come to.” I considered the thought. The slap represented something much larger about the decline of celebrities and the film industry that much of society had already reckoned with. Timothee Chalamet had gone shirtless for the evening and Joan Rivers turned in her grave beneath him. TikTok stars wore gowns and compared themselves to Grace Kelly. The evening’s hosts were dry and unfunny in an effort to not offend anyone, which above all speaks to the speed with which our media is changing: Chris’ “G.I. Jane” joke did not even run on the same thread of cruelty as those jabbed by Ricky Gervais or Jon Stewart. The celebrities took it, they didn’t slap or “cancel”. Hollywood represents greater issues in our society, as we become more insecure and therefore more sensitive and reactive. It’s not enough to critique the ball gown anymore.
 
I wish Joan Rivers was still alive. She would lay down in a limousine’s path before she let a TikTok star grace the red carpet. She would skin Timothee with words, she would be the only celebrity to remind us that Jada profits massively off of her alopecia. She would lay upon Wanda Sykes some torrent of critiques for her PC jokes. Unfortunately, Joan passed in 2014 and it seems that Hollywood has gone with her.