Hollywood's elite get skewered

Producers for the 88th annual Academy Awards couldn’t have known it when they hired him—long before nominations failed to include a single minority in any of the acting categories—how ideal a choice comedian Chris Rock would be as emcee. In the history of entertainment awards ceremonies, there has perhaps never been so perfect a pairing of host and moment.

Before Monday night, Rock’s two best known bits were using an extremely offensive racial epithet to parse varieties of African-American social groups and positing that the United States is a racist nation therefore, as a black man, he was “born a suspect.” In Rock, the Oscars had the perfect person to diffuse tension by implying the #OscarsSoWhite boycott was overwrought and to appease protesters by poking a stick in the eye of the liberal attendees, who almost never find themselves on the losing end of the political outrage machine.

I confess, I thought Rock would navigate this narrow fjord by doing what his predecessors did in lower-stakes years—by making an obligatory self-conscious joke or two at the expense of his industry’s exclusivity, then subtly assuaging their discomfort by turning attention to Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, or right wing Christian stereotypes. It’s to Rock’s enormous credit that, as crude as his performance was at times, he did none of those things. In fact, I’m not sure he ever mentioned the presidential race (though others did). Instead, he charged at the elephant in the room, vaulted onto its back, and held on like a rodeo star.

Rock first put the controversy into perspective by noting black people didn’t protest their lack of representation in the “Best Cinematography” category in the 1960s because they were too busy protesting being lynched. And he suggested that some of those celebrities who publicly pledged to skip the ceremony, like Jada Pinkett Smith, were engaging in an empty symbolism because they weren't invited anyway. But that didn’t mean Rock let his colleagues off the hook, later taking aim at the self-congratulatory nature of Hollywood by saying the liberals around him are the “nicest white people he knows,” yet they still don’t hire blacks. He also suggested if black actors wanted to be regularly nominated, they would need a category like “Best Black Friend.”

In any other year, Rock might have been scolded over “minimizing” the serious subject matter of the nominated films with his satire (as he was in 2005, the last time he hosted). This year, the audience was too cowed by public disapproval to do anything but laugh.

As the show progressed, and Rock’s barbs grew more pointed, this strangely penitent dynamic likely created a disconnect for viewers at home. Who exactly did the white actors, producers, and directors, alternately applauding and nodding seriously along with Rock, think he was talking about when he chided, “We want the black actors to get the same opportunity as white actors”? It was almost as if they thought he must be referring to some other wealthy, influential, privileged entertainment industry insiders.

Things got even more surreal when Public Enemy’s rap song “Fight the Power” played over the closing credits. Who would the “Hollywood power” be if not the collection of glittering decision-makers gathered in the Dolby Theater on Sunday night? Though, it’s worth noting, the widespread headline that no people of color were represented in any of the major categories isn’t accurate. Mexican director Alejandro Gonzales Iñárritu won his second straight Best Director award for The Revenant—the first director in more than 60 years to achieve this back-to-back feat.

Rock’s direct aim at the progressives sitting in front of him was so extraordinary, the actual awards felt mostly like an afterthought. But to the extent the films took the stage, this was a year in which staple causes like the environment and LGBT rights got pushed to the side in favor of new, arguably more concrete concerns.

The biggest prize of the evening, Best Picture, went to Spotlight, a drama about the Boston Globe journalists who exposed rampant sex abuse in the Catholic Church. In something of a refreshing shift from the hostility toward religion often seen at the Oscars, producer Michael Sugar didn’t argue against faith in his acceptance speech but rather called on Pope Francis to restore faith by protecting children. The Big Short came up as another topical winner, taking home Best Adapted Screenplay for its story of how government and Wall Street corruption brought down the housing market. Leonardo DiCaprio tried to connect his role in The Revenant, which nabbed him his first Best Actor award, to climate change, but anyone who has seen the film will know that was a stretch at best.

Chances are, looking back in the years to come, few will recall who won at the 2016 ceremony. But Rock made it one Academy Awards that will live in the public’s memory because, for once, they were in on the joke.