No Thanks: Viewers Respond Poorly to Oscars Gratitude Ticker

Whether you were warned in advance that Oscar winners’ thank yous would be relegated to a list crawling across the bottom of the screen, or you experienced this discovery in real time, chances are good you were bowled over by the inadequacy and redundancy of the technique. The winners either repeated many of the names in their speeches or still found themselves cut off in the middle of shorter and more insightful acceptance speeches. It was visually jarring as well: do you watch the honoree smile and cry and attempt to climb the stairs, or do you struggle to catch the words of gratitude zipping by beneath them? Per Slate’s observation: “The change drained some of the personality from the speeches themselves. Why not let honorees explode with joy about whatever they want, even if that means rambling ecstatically through a list of names? They just won an Oscar!”

Here’s a reminder that you won’t be seeing your favorite actor’s gold statuette on eBay anytime soon, even if they fall on hard times. In order to take home an Oscar, the recipient signs a contract requiring them to offer it to the Academy for a mere one dollar before they can attempt to sell it anywhere else. No contract, no trophy! Incidentally, Kevin Spacey and Steven Spielberg are notable for having shelled out big bucks for gray-market Oscar trophies — but only so they could donate them back to the AMPAS archives.

Let’s not overlook Hollywood’s other big award night: The 2016 Razzie winners have been named, with “Fifty Shades of Grey” dominating all the top awards. There’s still hope for both Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan in the the future thanks to the Razzie Redeemer category, which acknowledges Worst Actors of yesteryear who have stepped up their game. This year  Sylvester Stallone took the prize for “Creed,” making up for a Golden Raspberry-studded past including films like “Rhinestone” and “Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot.”

As for next year’s Razzies, it’s safe to bet “Gods of Egypt” will be a major contender. In a post-mortem report entitled “Anatomy of a Big-Budget Bomb,” Variety picks over the bloated carcass of a movie that somehow managed to flop before arriving in theaters. While this is certainly indicative of creative struggles over at Lionsgate, the studio’s financial stake in franchise-building attempts like “Egypt” isn’t as high as you might imagine. They’re still full-bore ahead (for better or worse) with potential kingmakers like a “Power Rangers” film and a retelling of Homer’s The Odyssey.