The Compendium Podcast
An Assembly of Fascinating and Intriguing Things, a weekly variety podcast that gives you just enough information on a topic to help you stand your ground at any social gathering. We explore big stories from true crime, history, and extraordinary people.
The Compendium Podcast
The 96th Academy Awards: The Worst Oscars Ceremony Ever
In this episode of the Compendium, we delve into the chaos of the 1989 Oscars a night of Hollywood history so bizarre it’s often called the worst Oscars in hostory. But was it really?
From Rob Lowe's infamous duet with Snow White to the awkwardly swaying stars, dancing tables, and endless backdrops culminating in a bus-sized model of Grauman's Chinese Theatre mounted on Snow White's head, Alan Carr's disastrous production has left a legacy that made the Oscars what it is today, and I'm going to tell you all about it!
We give you the Compendium, but if you want more, then check out these great resources:
- “Eileen Bowman interview”: Hollywood Reporter
- “The Full 1989 Oscars Opening Number”: Youtube
- “The Stars of Tomorrow 1989 Oscars Number”: Youtube
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Credits:
- Hosts: Kyle Risi & Adam Cox
- Intro and Outro Music: Alice in dark Wonderland by Aleksey Chistilin
- All the Latest Things Intro: Clowns by Giulio Fazio
[00:00:01] Kyle Risi: So while she's standing in the front of the stage, delivering her line a figure appears on its stomach. And it starts crawling down the staircase. Oh, it's not over, is it? Head first. Exactly like the girl from the ring.
[00:00:17] It's Rob Lowe, belly crawling towards the shoe that's been left on the stage and when he finally gets it, the audience is clearly thinking, what the F***. Which is Lily's cue to then turn around, and I can only assume Rob was meant to throw the shoe at her so she could catch it, but he throws it and it hits someone in the crown. Lily's hand is literally on her head, [00:01:00]
[00:01:07] Welcome to the compendium, an assembly of fascinating and intriguing things. We're a weekly variety podcast where each week I tell Adam Cox all about a topic I think you'll find both fascinating and intriguing. We dive into stories pulled from the darker corners of true crime, the annuls of your old unread history books, and the who's who of extraordinary people.
[00:01:26] We give you just enough information to stand your ground at any social gathering
[00:01:32] Of course, I'm your ringmaster this week, Kyle Risi.
[00:01:35] Adam Cox: And I'm your flying monkey this week, Adam Cox.
[00:01:39] Kyle Risi: Like a trapeze artist?
[00:01:40] Adam Cox: Yeah, that's what I meant, sure.
[00:01:42] Kyle Risi: Today on the compendium takes us into an assembly of golden blunders and a Hollywood horror show. Best left in the past.
[00:01:52] Adam Cox: Ooh, a horror show.
[00:01:54] Kyle Risi: let me ask you this question.
[00:01:55] Adam Cox: Yeah.
[00:01:56] Kyle Risi: When you watch the Oscars, what are you watching it [00:02:00] for? What is the thing that you tune in for?
[00:02:02] Adam Cox: Uh, I don't know, best picture, the celebrities, the red carpet, um, the looks.
[00:02:09] Kyle Risi: Yes, exactly. So today I'm going to tell you about an Oscar ceremony. That Hollywood wishes we would all just forget. I'm talking about the 1989 Oscars, also known as the 61st Academy Awards.
[00:02:25] A ceremony that was so disastrous, so utterly cringeworthy. that it has been branded the worst Oscars in history. It was a night that, despite recognizing titans of cinema and film, ended up being completely overshadowed by a 12 minute opening number that can only be described as a fever dream.
[00:02:42] What, what happened in this? So to give you a sense of what it entailed, imagine a Disney princess. Imagine Rob Lowe. And his inability to sing in tune a cast of literal dancing stars, dancing tables, a bunch of elderly actors who could barely even stand [00:03:00] up, and backdrop after backdrop that just seemed to never end.
[00:03:04] This ceremony left everyone in Hollywood so mortified, and viewers at home so utterly bewildered. that following this night, the Academy did everything that it could to bury this event, even silencing the people that were involved. And as for Alan Carr, the guy responsible for these terrible Oscars, that was the end of his career, which is such a shame, because this is also the same guy that gave us Greece.
[00:03:30] Adam Cox: Oh, did he? Yeah. He's made the terrible Oscars.
[00:03:33] Kyle Risi: But that is the thing about Alan Carr, is that He's terrible. No, he's not. Adam, this is the thing. when it lands on the spectrum of good and bad, it always lands on one end or the other. It's either very, very good or very, very bad.
[00:03:46] Adam Cox: Well, maybe he's just like 50 50. He does something good and
[00:03:50] Kyle Risi: That's exactly it. Oh, yeah. Oh, I've done something good now I need to do something really shit.
[00:03:54] Adam Cox: I did listen to, um, Something about Arnold Schwarzenegger because he was like, I will star [00:04:00] in any film. That he could get his hands on when he was like the 80s and 90s. Because I think he recognised as a bodybuilder, that it doesn't matter if you lose, people only remember when you win. And so people only really remember him for his really good movies.
[00:04:14] Kyle Risi: When it comes to Alan Carr, he's remembered for both.
[00:04:17] Adam Cox: Right.
[00:04:18] Kyle Risi: But then in 2007. The internet, as it often does, they rediscovered the lost footage of these Oscars. And once again, ask the question, how did it all go so wrong?
[00:04:30] So in today's episode, I want to give you a blow by blow account of those infamous 12 minutes that left stars like Zor sigourney Weaver and Tom Hanks literally cringing in their seats.
[00:04:42] I'm also going to tell you about the Disney lawsuit against the Academy and the scathing open letter that was penned by Hollywood's biggest names declaring the night a total embarrassment for the entire industry.
[00:04:53] And after all of that, I want to then revisit the question. Was the 1989 Oscars really the [00:05:00] worst Oscars in history? Because regardless of what people say, the legacy that the 1989 Oscars leaves behind might really surprise us.
[00:05:10] Adam Cox: Okay, interesting.
[00:05:12] Kyle Risi: But of course, before we kick off, I think it's time for All the Latest Things.
[00:05:20] Step right up and welcome to this week's All the Latest Things, where we unveil the fascinating, the extraordinary, and the downright loopy stories, strange facts, and intriguing tidbits from the past week. Adam, what's your headline act today?
[00:05:34] Adam Cox: So Kyle, have you heard about, one of the latest inventions that is now apparently available in Switzerland?
[00:05:42] Is it something to do with the mountains? What else would you go to Switzerland for?
[00:05:46] Kyle Risi: Um, cheese.
[00:05:48] Adam Cox: No.
[00:05:48] Do you remember watching Futurama? Oh, the Suicide Machine. The Suicide Booth. Suicide Booth. And this is what's been invented now. There is now a booth which you can go lay in. And [00:06:00] that will send you asleep. So this is now a real life thing.
[00:06:03] Kyle Risi: Mmm, I've, I think I have heard of this actually.
[00:06:05] Adam Cox: It's called the Suicide Pod, dubbed the, the Tesla of euthanasia.
[00:06:10] Kyle Risi: The Tesla. Is it made by Elon Musk? I don't know. Is he an investor?
[00:06:15] Adam Cox: I know, I have no idea, but that's what someone's nicknamed it, which I think is a bit weird, but it is like a capsule.
[00:06:20] And what happens, uh, the chamber is flooded with nitrogen, which then reduces oxygen levels so fast that the person inside just loses consciousness, within the first minute. And I guess it's like going into a peaceful, even euphoric, sleep, within about 10 minutes.
[00:06:36] So a very peaceful way to die. And one of the reasons people are doing this is because you don't have to, depend on a doctor or any assistance in doing it. You just go let yourself in and go to sleep.
[00:06:48] Kyle Risi: I guess the, Question there is that when you choose to commit suicide not everyone supports that decision when you then pass your family might be [00:07:00] really angry and hurt by this and they might try and hold the doctor or the nurses responsible for essentially administering you whatever drugs it is and I'm assuming that this booth is Something that allows the person looking for the suicide to administer it on their own a call, right?
[00:07:18] Then there's no question. You've gotten in, you've also pressed the button.
[00:07:22] Adam Cox: Or voice control in case you can't press the button.
[00:07:25] Kyle Risi: What if you can't speak?
[00:07:26] Adam Cox: Um, then I don't know.
[00:07:29] Kyle Risi: Hand signals.
[00:07:30] Adam Cox: Yeah. So yeah,it's crazy. It looks like this.
[00:07:34] It looks like a DeLorean. yeah, that's apparently been released, quite recently. And so people are now going to start euthanizing themselves in these booths. Some people are obviously a bit, any, this topic is quite sensitive.
[00:07:45] So some people are saying this is horrible, whatever, but I guess it is, like you say, it's trying to put the ownership on the person that wants to do that. But then I guess, I don't know what the controls are around that.
[00:07:55] Kyle Risi: See, the thing is though, my opinion on These types of things Is [00:08:00] that we as a culture become so obsessed with trying to prolong life That we've got to the point where we can prolong life all the way into your nineties but quality of life is not there So typically now on average people live the last 10 years of their life in pain, sometimes immobile. And we shy away from having conversations around how we can die with dignity https: otter. ai
[00:08:24] This could potentially help with that. It can start helping with healthy conversations around your end of life and how you can die with dignity. Yeah, so I think yeah, it's quite an interesting little device that they've created there.
[00:08:36] Adam Cox: Yeah, hopefully you've got some more More positive news than that.
[00:08:40] Kyle Risi: well a little bit Maybe it might be in a little bit bad taste now that you've brought up your suicide booths but have you heard that prisons in Brazil are swapping out their guard dogs for guard geese?
[00:08:53] Adam Cox: Geese. Are they extremely violent in Brazil?.
[00:08:55] Kyle Risi: I think they're violent anywhere. I don't know.
[00:08:57] Adam Cox: Yeah, you definitely don't want to piss a geese off [00:09:00] no matter where in the world you are. How they managed to get them onto the Christmas table at Christmas, I don't know, because the farmers must be like
[00:09:06] Kyle Risi: Yeah, you've got to shoot them from afar, basically. So prisons in Brazil, they've swapped out their guard dogs for geese because essentially, and I've got to say it, because honking is the new barking.
[00:09:15] Honking. Honk, yeah, because that's what geese do, right? Uh huh. No, I guess so. But,but yeah, the noise that a goose makes, he honks. Did you know that?
[00:09:28] Adam Cox: I think I did, but it's just really funny.
[00:09:30] Kyle Risi: So there is this prison in Brazil, they've got rid of their guard dogs and instead they've replaced them with these geese instead.
[00:09:36] So they call them like watch geese and I guess that's just purely for a lack of a better word. The way that these prisons are kind of set up is they typically have a fence around the perimeter and then there is like a clearance around that perimeter and then there is another fence.
[00:09:51] And that's where the guard dogs would usually live, but now this is where the geese live. So essentially that if you try and break out and you climb over that first [00:10:00] fence and you go into that particular clearing, it's the Goose's territory, essentially, and they will then just start going mental and even attack you as well.
[00:10:09] Right, so they're more reliable. They are more reliable. And the thing is though, the reason why they're more reliable is because unlike guard dogs, they cannot be bribed with food.
[00:10:20] Really? Well, no, you're going to, you're going to throw Or, I don't know, I don't know, what do they eat? Some grass? Slugs?
[00:10:26] I guess they eat grass and they probably have some feed, but you can't, like, bribe them like you can with a dog, right?
[00:10:30] You can't bribe a dog to keep quiet. So, yeah, so they got these geese just patrolling these, inside of these pyramids. That feels like
[00:10:37] Adam Cox: a whole new business that, that, I don't know if you're a farmer, maybe you're like going out of business because land or crops aren't as good, and you're like, what am I going to do with all my geese?
[00:10:45] I don't know. Send them to
[00:10:46] Kyle Risi: the prison.
[00:10:46] Adam Cox: Yeah, I've got to start up my security firm.
[00:10:49] Kyle Risi: But I guess there's also some other practical reasons as well, because I guess dogs need to be looked after, they need company, they need, I don't know, to be told that they're a
[00:10:56] Adam Cox: good boy. Need to go for walkies.
[00:10:57] Kyle Risi: They need to go for walkies.
[00:10:58] But whereas a goose, you just [00:11:00] leave them to their own devices, right? Yeah. And also geese have got really great ultraviolet vision as well, which means they can see really well in the day and really well at night. They're always on watch, But apparently this goes all the way back to the Roman period, because before they had guard dogs, they were using geese to protect their property, to protect their land. So this goes all the way back to the Roman period.
[00:11:19] Adam Cox: This isn't a new thing.
[00:11:20] Kyle Risi: No! Brazil. But they're bringing it back, right?
[00:11:22] It's a retro thing. Bring it back. Bring back guard geese.
[00:11:26] Adam Cox: Yeah, cool. Well, hopefully,let's see if it works out because it felt like it perhaps, I don't know, they got rid of it, maybe for a reason.
[00:11:33] Kyle Risi: Because the Roman Empire literally fell apart.
[00:11:37] Adam Cox: Yeah, but you can, we still took the roads and some of the systems and stuff
[00:11:40] Kyle Risi: like that. Because they left those behind. That's why after the Roman period, there was the Middle Ages. Or the Dark Ages. So
[00:11:48] Adam Cox: you're saying that they scooped up all their geese when they ran
[00:11:50] Kyle Risi: back. And they pissed off, yeah. I reckon they left the geese behind and then all the people from the Middle Ages like Henry Tudor just ate all the geese.
[00:11:58] [00:12:00] Probably. So I guess that's all my latest things. Should we get on with the Oscars of 1989?
[00:12:04] Adam Cox: Yeah, let's do it.
[00:12:05] Kyle Risi: So, Adam. On March the 29th, 1989, the 61st Academy Awards Ceremony at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles is about to kick the fuck off. Okay. All the stars. of the night are packed into the auditorium when suddenly the event opens with a man standing at the entrance to the theater.
[00:12:30] He says, Now, ladies and gentlemen, one of the greatest legends of Hollywood. The audience is buzzing with excitement, wondering, Oh my God, like who's it going to be? Is it going to be Audrey Hepburn? Is it going to be Cary Grant? Who's it going to be? And then he announces, and here she is, back again, it's Ms. Snow White!
[00:12:54] Adam Cox: Right? Where's she been? I didn't realise she
[00:12:58] Kyle Risi: performs. [00:13:00] Exactly! Where the fuck's she been? And then a woman dressed exactly as Snow White appears, and not just any Snow White, she looks exactly like Snow White at like a kid's birthday party, right? And she says to the announcer, in a voice that can only be described as really high pitched and squeaky.
[00:13:14] Like the voice that Gypsy Rose Blanche had used in the episode that we did. Right, okay. So of course, I'm going to try and do the voice.
[00:13:23] Good evening, Mr. Archer. I'm so excited to be here tonight. I'm a little late though. Can you tell me how to get into the theater? And Mr. Archer, I assume, responds, That's easy, Snow!
[00:13:36] Just follow the Hollywood Stars! And then the doors open and you think, Oh, that's cute, that's a cute little gimmick. You think he's beckoning to all the Hollywood Stars who are already in the theatre. Right.
[00:13:47] But no. The Hollywood Stars are actually, literally, giant gold glittering stars with legs. And these dancers emerge from behind Snow White and Mr. Archer, wearing black pantyhose [00:14:00] and heels. Like Mario with stars? Like, just stars? But with big sexy legs. Okay. With sexy legs. And they are giant cardboard stars covered in gold glitter, completely concealing the person inside them. And they don't even have eye holes at all. So they can't see. They're just stars with human legs.
[00:14:18] Adam Cox: Okay, so, um, I feel like this is definitely a fever dream. I've never seen the Oscars ever open like this before. No.
[00:14:26] Kyle Risi: And this is what makes this such an iconic. opening ceremony, essentially.
[00:14:32] So now Snow White says, Oh, follow the Hollywood stars. And then she runs in after the stars as they shuffle past her into the auditorium. Meanwhile, on stage, there are 20 more gold stars with human legs, all just shuffling out. And the stars are so large, they're so cumbersome they can't really do anything they're just like bobbing up and down and swaying to the music, because they can't do anything else.
[00:14:52] And this is where we get our first shot of the audience, who are Gobsmacked. Already looking [00:15:00] perplexed. Can we sneak out? They're like, what the fuck is happening? The first person we see is Zagorny Weaver. And she has literally her hand over her mouth. She's trying to stifle kind of the laughter. She's like, Snow White runs down the aisle from the back of the theater where she's entered.
[00:15:15] She's stopping briefly to try and interact with the crowd on the way to the stage. If you've ever been to the Lion King Broadway show when it starts, all the kind of the the animals coming down the aisle. But the thing is though it takes you by surprise because you don't know they're coming from behind So you all were like, huh, and you're a bit like startled, but then you also you're amazed.
[00:15:32] They're not amazed
[00:15:35] So she's running down the aisle trying to interact with all the different stars on the way To the stage except it's very clear that none of them want her anywhere near them. As she makes her way to the stage she starts singing I only have eyes for you but the lyrics have been changed to we only have stars for you.
[00:15:54] Right. And this time she is actually just referring to all the stars that are in the auditorium. The celebrities. [00:16:00] Exactly.
[00:16:00] And all the celebrities are all desperately hoping that she doesn't approach them. The last thing they want is a clip of her engaging with them appearing on the news.
[00:16:09] Adam Cox: Could you have like, faked a phone call going, what's that? Sorry, I gotta go.
[00:16:12] Kyle Risi: Oh, yeah, sorry. Just, just a minute, Snow White.
[00:16:15] So like, all these stars are just like, get the F away from me. This is so embarrassing. And apparently, as we'll learn later, like, she goes up to Michelle Pfeiffer and tries to grab her hand, and Michelle Pfeiffer just rips her hand away. And she's like, no, I'm not having any of this.
[00:16:29] And she's like, completely blanks her. And Tom Hanks, literally the best actor in the world. I think he had just done like Philadelphia. Oh yes, yeah, I remember. He cannot hide the look of embarrassment on his face and you can see the pain he's feeling for her in that brief moment that he's on camera.
[00:16:46] Wow. And Snow White, as she's going up, like she ends up just failing to engage with a lot of the stars and the ones that she does react with are just completely caught off guard and because it just happened so quickly so unexpectedly so they don't know [00:17:00] what's going on so they're just like yay yay okay and then she's gone So, I feel really bad for her.
[00:17:06] And finally, Snow reaches a stage where she's probably just as relieved as the audience because nobody wanted her anywhere near them. So she's standing there with all the stars with the human legs and they're all just bobbing up and down, just swinging from side to side. And she says, Good evening and welcome to the 61st Academy Awards.
[00:17:26] And you think, Oh my God, it's done. It was just a little gimmick. It's all over now. But it's not. Okay.
[00:17:33] It's so exciting to be back in Tinseltown. Oh, I've missed it. I remember the movie premieres from the Grauman's Chinese Theatre and the wonderful stars and parties at the Coconut Grove. Why, I have so many wonderful, wonderful memories of my Hollywood. Adam, [00:18:00] you think that's bad?
[00:18:01] Adam Cox: I mean, I don't think. I know that's bad.
[00:18:04] Kyle Risi: And then in this moment, the orchestra just erupts with a drum roll and Hooray for Hollywood starts playing and Hooray for Hollywood? Have you never heard that song? No. I'm not going to sing it oh, but you can sing the other song? I'm doing a voice.
[00:18:17] I'm not singing. I'm doing the voice. So that starts to play and all the stars, human legs just run off the stage and the curtain behind them lifts to reveal a set for the Coconut Grove Club with obviously a bunch of dancers all in position. And I assume this is the club that Snow used to go to. Sniff a lot of snow hats and
[00:18:39] Adam Cox: a lot of blow
[00:18:39] Kyle Risi: and do it a lot of blow blow snow. Yes No, it's do some blow snow. Yeah, you got some blow snow.
[00:18:45] Adam Cox: She never got a sequel to the Snow White because she was too high. She went off the wagon
[00:18:51] Kyle Risi: I probably I believe it. So these are the memories that she is referring to all the nights of the coconut grove sniffing blow Snow White kind of twirls off stage, and all the dancers [00:19:00] start dancing in pairs.
[00:19:01] And it kind of reminds me of the dancing from like, Dirty Dancing, but not the DIRTY dancing. It's kind of like the sense of dancing that they do with all the holiday makers early on in the film. So it's still a little bit like, not too It's like PG dancing. So it's that kind of dancing. And they're all wearing kind of like tuxedos and sequined slip dresses with big like kind of 1980s hair, right? And they're right proper going for it. And then a voice over the mic says, Ladies and gentlemen, Merv Griffin!
[00:19:30] And then a spotlight hits, and I assume it's Merv Griffin, And he starts singing. I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts. Dly. D what? ? Yeah.
[00:19:40] Adam Cox: Yeah. I, I forgot what ceremony are we at? . I'm really confused. .
[00:19:45] Kyle Risi: It's just so random. So he walks over. to three giant coconut cocktails all sitting at the bar but they're not cocktails because all of a sudden the cocktails lift off the bar and we realize they're [00:20:00] actually giant coconut cocktail hats on the heads of three dancers who are doing a conga line behind Merv while he sings I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts.
[00:20:10] I've got big ones. I got small ones. I've got some as big as your head. And he just makes his way to the front of the stage. And then he says, good evening and welcome to the fabulous coconut grove where every night is exciting. And then he adds, meet the stars. And then the camera just pans to the left.
[00:20:30] And then you realize there's a row of people that were sitting on these bistro tables behind the dirty dancing dancers. Right. And adam, they're all really old. They're all the stars of yesteryear. The golden age. Exactly, yeah. And they're all about to be paraded on stage as part of this opening number.
[00:20:50] And when I say they're old, I mean, Adam, they can barely walk. They're like wheeled on. Each one of them has a dancer on either side to help lift them up off their chair and bring them [00:21:00] to the centre of the stage. Okay. It's so undignified and this is also part of the problem that they have. This is why this went down in history as one of the worst Oscars ever because these are the old supposed to be respected stars of yesteryear and they've just been paraded on stage in this weird, very quick Like puppets. Exactly.
[00:21:18] So Merv goes, Mr. Buddy Rogers! And the audience applauds and it's very clear that Buddy has not done anything for a long time so he's super excited to be there, he's milking every second that he has on that stage and it's like four seconds, then they call out the next name, Miss Ellen Spade, who again is just happy to be included . Then . he calls Mr. Tom Martin, and I don't see him get up. I just assume it's because he's literally too old to stand. Instead, Merv goes, and his beautiful wife! And she's like, 40 years younger than him. So she bounces up and she's escorted to the center of the stage and she does this little sexy routine for about five seconds. She kicks a couple times and then she's tipped backwards and then that's just the end of her bit and then [00:22:00] she exits off stage.
[00:22:01] Adam, this is the first controversial moment of this entire skip because these, like I said, these people were legends of the industry and it feels just like they've just been paraded in this really weird, quick, dismissive fashion. Like they literally have one second on camera and they're like, And that is it.
[00:22:16] And all this really busyness is going on around them that you can barely even make out who they are. And people just end up thinking it's just really disrespectful.
[00:22:25] Then Snow White comes back out and I think she only comes out because the next few famous people literally just cannot stand up from their seats. She's kind of there to kind of just dance and then just distract from what's going on. And the ones that can stand just get up, they wave, and then they leave the stage clearly thinking like, Jesus, I've made a mistake, because it's just so chaotic in this moment.
[00:22:47] And before you know it, you don't even know what's happened. And they've already introduced all the stars.
[00:22:51] Then Merv turns to Snow White, who I think the producers told her to always stay in character no matter what, even when she [00:23:00] doesn't have a line, because the whole time she's like
[00:23:05] and she's just constantly making these like princess Disney noises and it's really off because it's really high pitch and every time there's dialogue and she is making one of these noises. It really pierces through your ears. So she's constantly making these breathy squeaky noises.
[00:23:20] And then Merv says to Snow, isn't it exciting, Snow? Isn't it thrilling? It gets better. Meet your blind date, Rob Lowe. And then Snow, I guess, she's like, and she's got this look on her face like a deer in headlights. And then a young Rob Lowe then walks out on stage. In his tuxedo?
[00:23:43] Adam Cox: Wow, like Rob Lowe is in this.
[00:23:45] Kyle Risi: Rob Lowe is in this.
[00:23:47] Rob is like the biggest heartthrob of the 1980s. So this moment is supposed to be like a bit of a Prince Charming kind of moment where they play like the Prince Charming music as he's kind of walking out and you can tell in [00:24:00] this moment It's supposed to get a bit of a laugh But there's just nothing . Snow White then says, Oh, Mr Rob Lowe, I'm such a fan. And he goes, Really, Snow? I'm a big fan of yours. But there's so much I'd like to know about you. And then from the back of the stage, two waiters approach them, each with a silver tray. And on those trays is a microphone and Rob Lowe and Snow White each pick up a microphone.
[00:24:25] Oh God. And again, this is far from over because they're about to launch into a duet.
[00:24:31] Adam Cox: That's what I thought you were going to say.
[00:24:32] Kyle Risi: Of Tina Turner's proud Mary, that's not what I thought you were gonna say. . . But of course, the lyrics have been rewritten to suit the occasion making it. Cringe as F, because nobody, Adam, nobody has asked for this. This is the Oscars, which is supposed to be a sophisticated and elegant affair. Also, Rob Lowe, he can not sing.
[00:24:59] Adam Cox: I don't know [00:25:00] what to say. Have you got the lyrics for this rendition? Yeah,
[00:25:04] Kyle Risi: yeah, yeah. When he first starts singing, you think okay, this is cute. oh, he's making fun of the fact that he can't sing. Nope, he's trying his damnedest to sing. So Snow White kicks off. I'm really terrible at singing, by the way, so I'm not one to talk. But she kicks off with, He used to work a lot for Walt Disney, starring in cartoons every night and day. Then Rob follows with, But you say goodbye to grumpy and sleepy, left the dwarves behind, came to Tinseltown. And then together they go, Big lights keep on burning, cameras keep on turning, Ooh, rolling, rolling, keep the cameras rolling.
[00:25:47] Oh no.
[00:25:48] And then of course, Proud Mary famously changes tempo. Rob Lowe drags the lyrics down real [00:26:00] deep and he goes, keep the cameras rolling. And then Snow White goes, and then the music just erupts. And then Rob Lowe sings, Now you've made it big in the movies, come to Hollywood, learned to play the game. You've become a star as an animated mama. place on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Big lights keep on burning. Cameras keep on turning.
[00:26:26] Snow White and then Rob at the same time. They then start doing this really sexy dancing together and all the dancers with the giant cocktail hats all start coming out to join them. And it's just going wild.
[00:26:38] And then one of the dancers, who luckily does know how to sing, has been obviously instructed to sing the song from here on in, just to carry the song forward, because they're so terrible. And they
[00:26:50] Adam Cox: decided that on the spot, going, can you take over? Can you just take over? Exactly.
[00:26:54] Kyle Risi: And while all of this is happening, I kid you not, the tables and chairs that have been on stage this [00:27:00] entire time, all of a sudden, stand up and they have
[00:27:04] Adam Cox: human legs of their own. So the tables were actually people bent over?
[00:27:08] Kyle Risi: They were people. So they're literally their heads pop out from the top and there's a table lamp on top of them and attached to their sides are the table and chairs. That the People on the stage we're sitting at I
[00:27:20] Adam Cox: mean,
[00:27:22] Kyle Risi: what? This feels
[00:27:23] Adam Cox: like some kind of fan fiction. If I was in the audience, if I was a Hollywood actor and I wasn't up for an award, I'd be out of there.
[00:27:32] Kyle Risi: I think a lot of these stars wanted to be out of there. So then Rob Lowe, Snow and the Dancers and the three coconut pantomime dames with the cocktails on their head are all now just marching in place and drowning out the only good singing from the coconut head lady is Rob just going do do do do do completely out of tune like I don't know how he messes that up.
[00:27:56] I bet he's oh you can't upstage me and he's really trying [00:28:00] he's like putting his whole diaphragm into it and it's kind of the ending bit of the song. Uh huh. And he does this all the way to the very end, and then eventually, the entire thing just abruptly ends, and everyone's hands are in the air, everyone's breathing heavily, you can see everyone's chest kind of like, bouncing up and down, and they're all like, kind of freezing in frame, and that moment, Adam, goes on for an eternity while you just watch and you wonder, like, Do I clap? Exactly! Is the audience going to clap? And I, and they do. But I think they only do because they're like, it's over. It's finally over.
[00:28:38] Adam Cox: Surely there can't be a second song.
[00:28:40] Kyle Risi: And then this is the first time that they actually cut to the crowd and you see like Sybil Shepard, who's just looking around frantically just to kind of see what other people's reactions are because I think she's in such disbelief.
[00:28:52] Uh, Robert Downey Jr. Camera cuts to him and he's just got this weird smug look on his face, like he's half kind of heartedly clapping going, [00:29:00] bet this is
[00:29:00] Adam Cox: what drove him to drugs. Do you think? Yeah. Was
[00:29:02] Kyle Risi: he a big drug addict? Yeah.
[00:29:04] Anyway, so Snow and Rob and the rest of the cast, they all run off stage and all the props on the stage are then wheeled away and everyone thinks, good, we can finally get on with the ceremony.
[00:29:16] And then the backdrop of the coconut grove lifts and there's another backdrop. And everyone in the audience is like, uh, fuck, there's more. So behind this backdrop is a set of the Grauman's Chinese box office theatre that again, Snow White. Talked about in her opening sentence. I felt like so long ago. It did! It did, didn't it? Now you know what these people went through.
[00:29:40] Snow White and Rob Lowe, they walk over to the box office, and they stand there while she goes, dreams come true. Dreams come true in the Chinese theatre. It's a place where you can come near and far. While she sings, the camera is really low down on Rob he grabs her hand and then he kisses it, but he [00:30:00] kisses it in a really creepy way.
[00:30:01] It's almost like he's eating Snow White. her hand. It's just and it just goes on forever and it's just really awkward and then both Rob and Snow grab each end of the box office prop that's on stage and then you realize it can actually come apart and it reveals a lineup of 25 traditional theater ushers and the ushers are all wearing kind of red and gold suits with it like a pillbox hat and they're all lined up in a row.
[00:30:27] They start doing like a goose step march kicking and dancing almost like the can can but not quite . They're singing how life can be grand from the third row. And whenever you're feeling down in the dumps, just put on Judy's red pumps and go to the movie picture show. As in Judy Garland. I thought so, yeah, from Wizard of Oz. And when it's all done they do this little weird little formation where they run around the stage and do like a little weird lineup thing and then they leave. And while that's happening The backdrop lifts to reveal yet another backdrop, and this [00:31:00] time you know it's the last one because they've kind of hit like a black wall with like, twinkly lights on it.
[00:31:05] You can't go further, you can't go any further back. It's the last one. So everyone knows this and they're all like, thank fuck.
[00:31:11] All the ushers start singing, hooray for Hollywood, and then in the center of the stage, there is Snow White. Now, bear with me, because it's difficult for me to explain what that is. I was looking at it appears that she's kind of stationary in the center of the stage kind of stuck on the stage The reason she's stuck is that on top of her head is a giant bus size model of the Grauman Chinese Theatre entrance and Adam it's Like eight meters tall. That's on her head. And it's balancing on her head.
[00:31:48] How? It just is. She's got like a neck of like steel. Exactly. So it's obviously it's very clear that it's not the actress that's playing Snow White. They've obviously done like a little bit of a [00:32:00] switcheroo because putting this eight meter tall prop on her head would clearly take hours. And so the actor It's obviously been back there for hours, just with this thing stuck in her head in place waiting for this little moment where this backdrop will lift and you have to look it up. It's weird. I still don't get why. You gotta find out why.
[00:32:20] So then from the wings of the stage, a pair of giant staircases. With two giant Oscars on each end of the staircase get wheeled in and they start coming towards each other You can tell they're going to be one single staircase once they reach the middle as they come together They start to conceal Snow White who is behind the staircases So you don't see Snow White anymore, but you still see the theater visible on the top of the head so obviously the stairs are the entrance to that theater. Got you. So it's like, bye Snow.
[00:32:55] Adam Cox: Is she, that's it? She's out. She's dead.
[00:32:57] Kyle Risi: You don't see her anymore. And then the cast starts [00:33:00] singing the final line of the song, and in the closing bars, it's almost exactly like the intro for Family Guy, that very last kind of snippet where you see them on the stairs. It's exactly like that. Imagine that. Got you. That's what's happening.
[00:33:13] Then, when that ends, the doors of the Grauman Theatre, presumably still on Snow White's head, then opens. And out walks Lily Tomlin. Who's Lily Tomlin? Lily Tomlin is from Grace and Frankie.
[00:33:26] Adam Cox: Oh, okay.
[00:33:26] Kyle Risi: Famous, famous actress. So, she comes out, she's waving to the crowd, and the crowd are like, Thank god, Lily's here.
[00:33:33] Like, she's gonna take care of us.
[00:33:34] She's gonna save us. So she walks down the stairs, and she kind of like, looks like she loses her footing. Ever so slightly. Like, it's not a big deal, but it's enough for you to go, You What happened there? So Lily then walks out to the front of the stage and she says, I told them that I'd be thrilled to do the Oscars if they could only come up with an entrance and everyone laughs. Partly because it's funny, but also partly because thank God it's over. [00:34:00] And that
[00:34:00] Adam Cox: was an entrance. That's for sure.
[00:34:01] Kyle Risi: You know, that feeling like when you're at a party and it's a bit shit and you want to go home, but you can't because the person who's taking you home, is still having a good time.
[00:34:10] So you're just like a bit meh. But then you don't realize how meh you're feeling until that moment that your ride comes up to you and goes, should we just go home? And yeah, straight away your mood lifts. Well, that's what Lily Tomlin has done in this moment by the end of this number, right?
[00:34:29] She. Was everyone's ride home. Essentially. So, I said like, Lily was walking down the stairs and it looked a bit like she lost her footing. just for a moment. She
[00:34:39] Adam Cox: tripped over Snow White's head?
[00:34:40] Kyle Risi: No, she didn't. She, just paused for a second. it's not too clear. But what I think happened is that she kicked off one of her shoes in kind of like a Cinderella leaving her shoe on the steps kind of thing.
[00:34:51] So you're like, oh, was that an accident? Is that her shoe? did her shoe just fall off? Did she put it there? It's just really strange, right? But it's enough for you to notice that something odd [00:35:00] happened.
[00:35:00] So while she's standing in the front of the stage, delivering her line about that entrance, that joke, in the background, a figure appears on its stomach.
[00:35:11] And it starts crawling down the staircase. Oh, it's not over, is it? Head first. Exactly like the girl from the ring.
[00:35:23] It's Rob Lowe, belly crawling towards the shoe that's been left on the stage and when he finally gets it, the audience is clearly thinking, what the f Which is Lily's cue to then, look, and she turns around, and I can only assume Rob was meant to throw the shoe at her so she could catch it, but he throws it and it hits someone in the crown.
[00:35:48] Lily's hand is literally on her head, she is mortified, she gives up on that part altogether, she just turns to the camera, unscripted, and says, A A billion and a half people just watched that [00:36:00] and now everyone's trying to make sense of it And she is literally thinking exactly what everyone in the auditorium is thinking the entire room erupts And they're like, yeah lily's thinking what we're thinking And that was it. That was the opening 12 minutes of what is considered the worst Oscars opening ceremony of all time. That was 12 minutes? That felt like a lifetime. Adam, when you watch it, it feels like a lifetime. And when you watch this on YouTube, it's so fucking weird.
[00:36:27] What is happening behind the scenes from here on in is just menacing.
[00:36:31] Because Rob Lowe, the producer, Snow White, their careers are all about to take a massive hit. Because immediately following this evening, the general consensus across All of Hollywood and across America is that this was a total disaster and everyone except Alan Carr in that moment knew it. It would take the mastermind behind this event, Alan Carr, a little bit more time. For that reality to sink in.
[00:36:57] Adam Cox: Does he think Oh, this is going really well. [00:37:00] What a great show that I'm putting on.
[00:37:01] Kyle Risi: 100%. That's exactly what he's thinking. There's never a question in his mind that this is terrible. But the thing is, though, from the very beginning, people knew that this was going to be shocking.
[00:37:13] The fact was that the very next day, when the reality started sinking in, because by the end of the evening, he was like, okay. Something's up.
[00:37:21] Adam Cox: No one's saying how great the opening
[00:37:23] Kyle Risi: ceremony was. Exactly! People were, literally people were avoiding him. So, still a little bit hopeful that it was still a bit good.
[00:37:29] The next day he goes for lunch at a Hollywood Society restaurant, and he deliberately asks for a table near the entrance, so that people can walk by and congratulate him as they come in. Instead, people see him, they immediately turn around and they leave so they don't have to talk to him.
[00:37:46] And those who are already in the restaurant, they beg, they beg the wait staff to give them an exit out of the back of the restaurant so they don't have to file past him. Wow, that's really bad. It's [00:38:00] awful.
[00:38:00] When the reviews start coming in, the New York Times states that the ceremony had earned a permanent place in the annuals of Oscar embarrassments.
[00:38:08] And a week later, Disney, dealing with the character assassination of Snow White's likeness, files a lawsuit against the Academy because they didn't ask for permission to use Snow White.
[00:38:21] Adam Cox: Yeah, because they've got to sell toys and movies, and if no one wants to buy Snow White anymore, it's down to this whole charade.
[00:38:30] And following this, 17 of Hollywood's most prominent actors, including Julie Andrews, Billy Wilder, and Gregory Peck, they all banded together.
[00:38:39] They penned this massive open letter to the Academy expressing their outrage and it says the 61st Academy Awards Was an embarrassment to both the academy and the entire motion picture industry.
[00:38:51] It is neither fitting nor acceptable that the best work in motion pictures be acknowledged in such a demeaning fashion. We urge the president [00:39:00] and the governors of the academy to ensure that future award presentations reflect the same standards of excellence as set by the films and the filmmakers that they honor.
[00:39:09] Wow. That's bad. I mean, to piss off Julie Andrews, that's quite a feat.
[00:39:14] Kyle Risi: I mean, if you piss off Mary Poppins, like, you've done something real bad, right?
[00:39:17] Adam Cox: Yeah, sees Snow White and this whole fiasco. And then Rob Lowe crawling down some stairs, throwing a shoe at someone.
[00:39:25] Kyle Risi: It's so cringe. So, in response, the academy, they launch an official review committee to try and figure out what the fuck happened and how such a tacky ceremony managed to get approved, and yeah, they later found out that it was all down to one person. .do you want to know how this all materialized and whose decision it was to put all this together?
[00:39:46] Adam Cox: W
[00:39:46] ell, Alan Carr, right?
[00:39:47] Kyle Risi: Yeah, but do you want to know how it happened?
[00:39:49] Adam Cox: Okay. I was gonna say, like, who did it? Alan. Surely him.
[00:39:53] Kyle Risi: So as you've just clearly established, the man behind this was a guy called Alan Carr. Yes, I [00:40:00] established this. Hey, this is just what's on the script, Adam! And I was going to ask you whether or not the name rings any bells, but you very clearly know That he was the guy that did the whole village people piece of crap.
[00:40:10] Yeah, and the guy that spurred you on to turn the entire country of Australia against you. We still get death threats from Australians.
[00:40:16] Adam Cox: Well, he pissed off a lot of actors as well, so I think, do you know what? He causes outrage.
[00:40:23] Kyle Risi: So obviously alan karr. He's a prominent hollywood producer. He's openly gay. He's very camp. He's very flamboyant And he's known for throwing the most amazing parties most famously As we said earlier on, and directing a little musical number called Grease. So he's responsible for some pretty decent stuff, but he's also known for some pretty terrible stuff, which probably should have been a red flag when they asked him to produce the Oscars. Because Alan also produced Can't Stop the Music, which if you recall from the Village People episode is the autobiographical musical about the Village People's origin.
[00:40:59] It was [00:41:00] so bad that it spurred the creation of the Golden Raspberry Awards, also known as the Razzies. So Adam, that's the thing about Alan's work is that it almost always falls On the extreme sides of the spectrum.
[00:41:14] But what Alan was consistently good at was putting on a spectacle. And when we think about the modern day film premieres with the famous red carpet with stars arriving in limos, there's paparazzi there, he was the mastermind behind making a spectacle out of just kind of the ordinary?
[00:41:32] Adam Cox: So they hadn't done this before. This is like the first time. So whilst he maybe put on a shoddy show, he actually introduced some elements that were actually quite interesting which actually people did like.
[00:41:44] Kyle Risi: Exactly that. Famously the premier of greece It was his idea to have olivia newton john turn up as kind of straight day sandy on the red carpet And then change into the kind of the hot pink leather sandy for the after party So he knew how to work the [00:42:00] press and to use them to promote movies and shows and Now all of that is just standard.
[00:42:07] So by 1989 there was this general feeling that the Oscars had become a bit too boring and too stuffy The previous year in 1988 the ceremony had received like a bunch of negative reviews The Academy reached out to Alan and asked if he'd be interested in producing the 1989 ceremony.
[00:42:27] And it had been years, of course, since Alan had produced anything noteworthy. He thought that this would be a perfect way for him to put himself back on the map. Remember, the job doesn't pay anything. Which, that was Yeah! You do it for the honour That's probably a lot
[00:42:43] Adam Cox: of stress to put yourself through, for not getting paid.
[00:42:46] But I'm guessing he's hoping this will secure him his next job.
[00:42:49] Kyle Risi: So Alan's idea for the ceremony was to adopt the review format.
[00:42:54] Adam Cox: Okay, so what is a review of what?
[00:42:58] Kyle Risi: So it's kind of like a theatrical kind [00:43:00] of entertainment that combines a bunch of different acts together. And a lot of parodies as well. So it will include songs, it will include sketches, it will include like dance numbers, a bit of comedy. Rather than having this continuous storyline, it's more of a showcase of different performances. Okay. And what you've just seen, that is a classic review format. But if you're not familiar with that format, then you're not going to know.
[00:43:20] And the trouble is, is that review formats were very popular. amongst the LGBT community. So the ordinary guy watching at home wouldn't really appreciate what they were watching.
[00:43:34] Adam Cox: It's just like a mishmash of different ideas.
[00:43:36] Kyle Risi: Yeah, and Alan is a massive fan of these and his favorite was something called Beach Blanket Babylon and Basically, it's a story that loosely follows the character of Snow White who leaves the Dwarves in the Enchanted Forest and goes on a journey Around the world looking for her Prince Charming and so it's through this lens that this opening number makes complete sense because it already is [00:44:00] a really famous thing that exists.
[00:44:03] Adam Cox: I guess it makes some
[00:44:05] Kyle Risi: more sense Not not
[00:44:07] Adam Cox: complete sense, but some sense.
[00:44:09] Kyle Risi: Okay, so imagine that you've never heard of cats before huh, and you are watching let's say an episode of Britain's Got Talent and there is like this little theater group They're gonna do like a little clip it of cats.
[00:44:23] Which already doesn't make any sense, And they come on stage dressed as cats and they're doing all this weird shit and it's out of context from what it is. It's gonna be a bit weird to you. You're not gonna be able, if you don't know, you don't know. Do you know what I mean? It's gonna be a bit like, what the fuck was that? Why were they singing to the outer layer or whatever. Do you want to say what I'm saying? I guess so. So I'm basically saying that Beach Blanket Babylon was kind of LGBT domain thing and this is in late 1980s. We're Gay culture hadn't really broken into the mainstream. And I just didn't think that people really got it.
[00:44:56] Adam Cox: People just weren't ready. He was ahead of his time. Is that what you're saying?
[00:44:59] Kyle Risi: I'm [00:45:00] saying, I think if people did get it, they would have been more forgiving. I don't know. They would have still gone, this is not elegant enough for the Oscars. But I think they would have got it. I get what you're
[00:45:09] Adam Cox: doing, but this is still kind of crap. Fine. Okay. I mean, I don't think you should use a Disney character
[00:45:15] Kyle Risi: No,
[00:45:15] Adam Cox: number one. That's not real and probably get someone who's I can sing not Rob Lowe
[00:45:20] Kyle Risi: Exactly
[00:45:21] Adam Cox: and sure have some dancing numbers and whatever.
[00:45:23] Kyle Risi: Okay. I see what's happening here See, I'm trying to give him the benefit the doubt.
[00:45:27] I'm trying to you know justified a bit, you're just full on attack.
[00:45:30] Adam Cox: No, yeah, like everyone, like Sigourney Weaver was at the time, and Cybill Shepard. I'd have been right there with her going, I know.
[00:45:41] Kyle Risi: So the woman who actually played Snow White was a woman called Eileen Bowman. Now, she gives a really great rundown, of how the show came together. So at the time she was just 22 and she had just arrived in Hollywood from San Diego to try and make it big as an actress. So her agent gives her like 15 pages of music to learn. She sings for [00:46:00] some people who they say, great, we need to see if you can fit into this dress.
[00:46:04] She tries on the snow white dress, it fits. They then put her in all the snow white makeup and everything, bundle her into a car with another actress who is, I assume, also applying for the same role because they look identical. They do that Spider Man like meme where they point at each other.
[00:46:20] And from there, they are driven to Alan Carr's house where he meets them in a caftan and his swanning around his mansion they both sing to him and at the end of it, she is off for the part and they literally shoot the other actress because like now she knows too much.
[00:46:37] Adam Cox: They shoot her. What? She's dead.
[00:46:38] Kyle Risi: Yeah, she's dead.
[00:46:39] Adam Cox: That's probably Not necessarily that bad. She actually went on to have a career afterwards.
[00:46:45] Kyle Risi: Yeah, probably. Yeah, because this ruined Snow White's career. So even after the moment that she's off the roll, she still doesn't really know what it is.
[00:46:53] Like, Alan literally says to her, Do you know what this is for? And she's like, Beach Blanket Babylon? And Alan's like, No, darling, [00:47:00] this is for the Oscars. And it's in two weeks. And she's like, Oh, shit.
[00:47:04] Right, so they go into complete lockdown rehearsals non stop day in day out She's living breathing this opening ceremony segment and Eileen says that it's immediately apparent that this is not going to be good Oh, no, she was like what if I got myself in for?
[00:47:22] Absolutely, but she's like Obviously never worked with a producer before, she just figures it'll all just come together in the end.
[00:47:30] Adam Cox: I guess she doesn't know any better, so
[00:47:32] Kyle Risi: She's like, I'm working with Alan Carr, the guy who, like, Invented Greece, do you know what I mean? And Greece 2. And Greece 2, maybe she doesn't know that. So apparently during rehearsals Rob Lowe had inside knowledge that this was all going to go to shit because he pulls her aside and he tells her that after this is done she needs to be really careful because there are sharks in the water and she's like, Okay, that's weird.
[00:47:57] So clearly, there is potentially [00:48:00] someone looking for heads, like, someone higher up knows that shit's gonna go down. Alan Carr's not listening, and now that's got back to the cast, and they're like, just be careful with all of this.
[00:48:10] Adam Cox: I'm surprised if this that's the case, then I'm surprised someone didn't go look, Alan. Can we just, like, cut the giant, theatre on someone's head, or whatever it might be. Can we just tone this down a notch? But they let it carry on. Surely the people who are running this show, would have seen this and gone, this isn't quite right. I don't understand. It almost feels like, maybe they didn't like Alan. Do you think? Well, to kind of go like, oh, well, it's too late now, whatever. You would have done something to save the show or at least amended it right up to the last minute. And if they didn't attempt to do any changes, that suggests Some kind of, I don't know, sabotage.
[00:48:47] Sabotage. Yeah. Interesting. So is this why Rob Lowe ended up having a sex tape? Because he was like, I need to have something else to talk about. Oh, you think he
[00:48:54] Kyle Risi: planned the sex tape?
[00:48:56] Adam Cox: Just caught up like some lady in his black book. And we're like, would you mind? Yeah, I
[00:48:59] Kyle Risi: mean, [00:49:00] sex tapes have worked really well for people.
[00:49:01] I mean, it worked really well for Kim Kardashian. And famously Rob Lowe.
[00:49:06] Adam Cox: Yeah? Yeah.
[00:49:07] Kyle Risi: So Eileen said that during her dress rehearsal that her instructions for her entrance were to go up to people along the aisles and to get them to interact with her while she was singing her song.
[00:49:17] But her only rule was to never approach Robin Williams because he's too unpredictable. What she didn't know was that spotting Robin Williams was going to be very, very difficult because when you're entering into the theater, all you see is the back of their heads. And the first person that she literally goes up to is Robin Williams and this is caught on camera.
[00:49:43] And in that video, you see that he turns to look at her and the second that she realizes him, she just quickly walks off. She's like,
[00:49:50] Adam Cox: oh, sorry. Why is he so unpredictable? In what way?
[00:49:54] Kyle Risi: I think because he just is. He's just a comedian. He's just a loose cannon.
[00:49:58] Adam Cox: Yeah, he probably would have made the [00:50:00] show fun.
[00:50:00] Kyle Risi: I guess they didn't want any chaos. Yeah. They wanted to keep things as predictable as possible. They didn't want any chaos. So she sees him, she touches him, she sees him and she's oh, nope, and she pisses off. She says that Tom Hanks and Martin Lando, they both give her this look of pity which really ends up there. Throwing her in that moment like throws her confidence and the show hadn't even started yet.
[00:50:22] Later, Martin Lando says that he really felt for it because when he looked into her eyes, he could sense the pain and the embarrassment that she was going through. And this is the only reason why he was pretty much one of the only people to interact with her because,He did it out of pure empathy and pity for her.
[00:50:39] Eileen says that when she approached Michelle Pfeiffer, she literally just snatched her hand away from her and she just refused to interact with her. And again, that just ended up knocking her confidence as well. She's not even got to the stage yet.
[00:50:51] Rob Lowe, says that the first person that he saw, In the crowd was Barry Leveson, who was of course nominated for Rain Man that same [00:51:00] year.
[00:51:00] And he says that he saw Leveson mouth, like, to the person next to him, What the F is this? And from that moment onwards, Rob was like, This is going to be bad.
[00:51:11] Adam Cox: So he's like, well, I'm going to go sing out of tune anyway.
[00:51:14] Kyle Risi: And there's 11 more minutes of this. So it's not gotten off. On the right foot at all and then martin hamlisch. He is the guy who did all the orchestra music, right? so he's down below. Apparently he desperately tried to steer alan away from the kind of the beach blanket babylon saying that just people just wouldn't Get it like it wouldn't translate well on stage the world wasn't ready for this very kind of like underground LGBT kind of performance and he just didn't listen.
[00:51:44] He just went ahead anyway You Are
[00:51:45] so, we won't go into it, but the 11 minute segment wasn't the only segment that Alan was responsible for on that night. There was another 6 minute skit as well, around about halfway through the ceremony, where Lucille Ball and Bob Hope, [00:52:00] they would come out, they do kind of like a little bit of a comedy skit.
[00:52:03] Their chemistry together is just incredible. When they're done, they then introduce the next number and it's called, I want to be an Oscar winner, which is all about celebrating the stars of tomorrow. So unlike the opening number, that celebrated kind of the stars of yesteryear, this is all about. The opposite of that. And this includes young stars like Christian Slater. It's really weird to see these people. Uh, Patrick Dempsey, Corey Feldman, uh, Jodie Fisher, Blair Underwood, Ricky Lake and Chad Lowe, who of course is Rob Lowe's brother.
[00:52:37] They're all on stage doing this little kind of like tap dance skit where they're kind of like, Oh, one day I'll win an Oscar and blah, blah, blah.
[00:52:43] It is bad. I was going to say that. That's so great. But it's not as bad. As the opening number. It's worth watching just to see Ricky Lake and Patrick Dempsey dancing around on stage as 16 year olds. It's just incredible. It's just really strange to see.
[00:52:58] Adam Cox: Yeah, I guess and did [00:53:00] this get critiqued in the same way or
[00:53:01] Kyle Risi: no because it was completely overshadowed by what had come before, right? Right. So following all of this Eileen says that backstage nobody would look at her and she just knew From that moment that she was in trouble. This is bad She just wanted a hole to open up and swallow her and her and rob They were supposed to kind of stay behind for the governor's ball But they were just both nope and they just left.
[00:53:25] The next morning, a lawyer was standing on her doorstep and asked her to sign an NDA saying that she couldn't talk about anything to do with the show for 13 years.
[00:53:36] Adam Cox: I'd be like, sure, but bump up my salary. This would have affected her employment
[00:53:41] Kyle Risi: And all of this was just in response to Disney threatening to sue the academy and the academy was just doing everything that they could to just to try and quell the backlash and soothe Disney because they were like looking for blood.
[00:53:53] And by the way this ceremony was the first time that the Oscars had been broadcast around the world via satellite [00:54:00] television. It's the first year it's going to be aired in Russia and so in total over a billion people watch this. So having Russia literally seeing this as their first example of American culture was just really embarrassing.
[00:54:14] Adam Cox: I bet they were like, oh, this is the Oscars?
[00:54:18] Kyle Risi: No, yeah.
[00:54:19] Adam Cox: Is this a Benny Hill show? Yeah, but this doesn't seem right. This is what we were jealous over? I don't know.
[00:54:25] Kyle Risi: So Rob Lowe releases a statement saying that he never really wanted to do the Oscars in the first place. He just kind of did it out of a sense of obligation. He was just essentially being a good soldier. But when it comes to Rob Lowe, the world quickly forgot that he was Snow White's date. Because as we said earlier on, a month after this happened, focus shifted to his sex tape.
[00:54:47] Conveniently. With him and a 16 year old. So yeah, 1989 was not a great year for Rob. But I will say, that A month after this happened as well, Lucille Ball, [00:55:00] who introduced the second act with Bob Hope, she tragically died, and a lot of people said this is what killed her. The
[00:55:07] Adam Cox: curse. The curse of the
[00:55:09] Kyle Risi: Oscars.
[00:55:10] And so as I said earlier on, Alan Carr thinks that the night went, Amazingly, he watched from the sidelines, he was transfixed on the performance, and he just was not paying any attention to the audience and how they were reacting. He's literally confused when Eileen and Rob, they don't want to stay for the after party.
[00:55:28] Adam Cox: Wow, he's like really, like, I don't know, naive? Just so
[00:55:32] Kyle Risi: absorbed in what he was doing, right? He just had the sense of belief that it was just incredible. It wasn't, of course, until he arrived for the after party that he realized that the show didn't land in the way that he thought it should have. Within an hour of arriving at the Governor's Ball, he's like, Okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna have to go.
[00:55:52] Adam Cox: Wow. To feel like that kind of, Hostility or eyes are on you or that kind of thing. That must have been quite uncomfortable. [00:56:00]
[00:56:00] Kyle Risi: I imagine so the next day there were no phone calls normally you expect a phone call from the head of the academy To thank you for doing this for free. There was no call. So he's still hopeful So that's when he then goes to lunch and the realization that he messes up
[00:56:17] Adam Cox: Everyone's deserting him.
[00:56:18] Kyle Risi: Literally, literally people are turning around to avoid him, begging to go out the back entrance so they don't have to talk to him. Two of his friends, they visit him that same afternoon and they just find him drunk, crying in his pool house alone.
[00:56:32] And he never gets another job producing anything in Hollywood ever again. He becomes a complete recluse and this goes on for 10 years. After which he dies from alcoholism. He literally drank himself to death.
[00:56:46] Adam Cox: As a result of this.
[00:56:48] Kyle Risi: Yeah, it ruined his career. It ruined his it
[00:56:51] Adam Cox: for free. That feels so Unfair in a way.
[00:56:55] Kyle Risi: That's it.
[00:56:55] Now in defense of the 1989 Oscars, even though it was branded as the worst [00:57:00] Oscars in history, it was actually really good. Like apart from the opening number, the ceremony itself leaves behind a legacy and introduces us for the very first time to a whole bunch of new things that today are so synonymous with the Oscars. So I think in my opinion, it's so unfair that this is branded as the worst Oscars when it's given us so much.
[00:57:24] So first of all, like Alan Carr, he gave Billy Crystal like a 10 minute kind of segment to do the Oscars. Whatever he wanted in a monologue and it was considered so good that Billy goes on to appear in nine more ceremonies over the years, even hosting in 1997, 1998, 2000, 2004, and also 2012.
[00:57:46] So, like, if it was that bad, how come we got someone like Billy Crystal coming out and doing his little comedy skit?
[00:57:54] Adam Cox: I guess this had good elements, right? Yeah.
[00:57:56] Kyle Risi: It did. Also, Alan also introduced the concept [00:58:00] of the red carpet being a spectacle in itself, because before 1989, it was just a matter of literally pulling up, walking inside, and Alan was like, let's televise it, right? Let's really ham up the paparazzi. Let's really get people pumped up. Let's really focus in on what people are wearing, and the stars, and the glamour of it all. Let's have viewers engaging with the stars. Let's make this perfect. part of the show. And now you can't even imagine an Oscars without the red carpet.
[00:58:27] Adam Cox: It doesn't matter if it's just Oscars. It's anything like a movie, a premiere or whatever. So is he? He's responsible for that. So this didn't exist whatsoever before? Nope.
[00:58:35] Kyle Risi: Nope. He invented the concept. He also makes backstage a spectacle. Like he transforms it into a lounge with couches and cocktails. And before this, like the stars of the show, they would just hang out in their own dressing rooms waiting for that, like that five minute call to say, Oh, like you're going to be on stage in five minutes. He transformed all that. He made it a spectacle.
[00:58:55] Adam Cox: And that bit was televised as well, like all the stars hanging out. Not initially,
[00:58:59] Kyle Risi: but I [00:59:00] think eventually it would be. There would be cameras back there because people are interested in that, right?
[00:59:04] Adam Cox: Yeah, yeah.
[00:59:04] Kyle Risi: He's also the person who decided to start using the phrase, and the Oscar goes to, rather than, and the winner is. Because he believed that just being nominated, You were a winner already, right?
[00:59:17] Adam Cox: Okay. They always say that when people like, I just, it's, I feel a winner just being nominated. Don't they always say that?
[00:59:24] Kyle Risi: The other thing that it gave us as well is that this concept of when the presenters come out on stage, like he really thought about the combination. of the people that will be coming out together, Lucille Ball and Bob Hope. Wonderful, wonderful pairing. Such great chemistry. He really made future producers think about that combination of who comes out to present the award.
[00:59:47] And that's so famous now, right? Like it's oh, what's the pairings, right? Yeah,
[00:59:51] All these elements combined transform the Oscars into The incredible kind of spectacle that we know of it today. And all of this is born [01:00:00] out of an event that is considered the worst and most embarrassing Oscars in history.
[01:00:04] So that's the question. Was this really the worst? Especially when it gave us the red carpet, the presenters, the prestige and the backstage flair?
[01:00:14] Adam Cox: Well, it sounds like he, I don't know, he's obviously very creative and has a lot of good ideas. He just needed someone there to edit. Tell him to edit that. No, don't do that. Cut that out.
[01:00:25] Kyle Risi: Like Coco Chanel, like, before you leave the house, always take one thing off. Yeah. When it comes to Alan Carr, before you go live, just cut one number.
[01:00:32] Adam Cox: Yeah, just somewhat, like, he's clearly throwing everything at the wall. Just maybe, yeah, take some of that off. Don't need to do it all.
[01:00:38] Edit it a bit, yeah. Yeah, he seems like a good guy overall.
[01:00:41] Kyle Risi: So here's a little fun fact for you. If you're a fan of Parks and Recreation with Audrey Plaza, Chris Pratt, and of course Rob Lowe. So Rob Lowe plays a character called Chris Traeger.
[01:00:53] And in the show, he is notoriously a terrible singer. And that is a [01:01:00] throwback to the 1989 Oscars. They wrote
[01:01:02] Adam Cox: that into his character.
[01:01:03] Kyle Risi: Yeah, being a terrible singer because of course he really was. As for Aileen, once her 13 year gag order expired, she ended up doing this incredible interview about everything that happened and hence why we know so much about the details of it.
[01:01:16] She now works in local theatre in her hometown. After all of this kicked off like immediately after the next day she was like fuck this and she just went straight home her sister like did try to persuade her to stay and take full advantage of the opportunity but she refused and the next day she turned on the news and people just relentlessly mocking her and this went on for weeks and she was just like nah.
[01:01:40] Adam Cox: Yeah i guess that's probably a lot to live through and if everyone's attacking then Yeah, you went out of it, but it's probably a good thing that social media didn't exist then.
[01:01:48] Oh my god,
[01:01:49] Kyle Risi: can you imagine? Ugh, do you think like, Snow White is one of her favorite films?
[01:01:55] Adam Cox: She probably cannot. She probably is triggered. Yeah. She probably will never watch Snow White. [01:02:00] Sure she even has Disney Plus. I think it's just too much.
[01:02:04] Kyle Risi: What is really sweet is that in her interview with the Hollywood Reporter, she says that the only good thing to come out of the night was backstage when she got to meet, Olivia Newton John. She walked into her dressing room and there was Olivia Newton John, asking to use her blusher and like her compact stuff.
[01:02:20] So she used it and she was like, she's had the same blush compactor Ever since like it's her most prized possession,
[01:02:26] So for years the academy they just try to bury the event and it isn't until 2007 when of course the video of this Terrible opening number resurfaces on YouTube and finally people start to acknowledge that actually this was a really important part of Oscar history and without it like the ceremonies of today wouldn't be what they are and what we love and what we appreciate so much about the Oscars. So honestly, I just think it was fine. Yeah, I really hammed it up when [01:03:00] I was explaining it to you, but I just think it was fine. But then again, I'm quite tacky. I
[01:03:07] Adam Cox: really liked it.
[01:03:08] Kyle Risi: I thought it was entertaining. I didn't think it was terrible.
[01:03:12] I don't
[01:03:12] Adam Cox: know. I feel like we've seen probably a whole lot of worse. Oh, we've become desensitized. A little bit, like back then, it's kind of like watching a horror movie, you know, from the 60s, you're like, this isn't scary. So maybe watching something trashy from 1989 is like, it's not that trashy. That's so
[01:03:27] Kyle Risi: interesting, that's a really interesting take.
[01:03:29] You could be right there, you could be onto something. People in the
[01:03:32] Adam Cox: 80s had class. Until 1989.
[01:03:35] Kyle Risi: Did they?
[01:03:36] I mean, to be fair, I've seen some worse moments of the Oscars. The only other one that comes to mind is, which I kind of also love as well, I did love it, but I know it was the worst, because it was just, I just know it wouldn't be received very well. Do you know what I'm going to say? No.
[01:03:49] Adam Cox: I'm
[01:03:50] Kyle Risi: The bit where Seth MacFarlane is singing about how he saw your boobs on the Oscars.
[01:03:57] Adam Cox: Whose boobs? Everyone's boobs. [01:04:00] When did he see them? What? You don't know what segment I'm talking about. No.
[01:04:03] This is brilliant.
[01:04:04] Kyle Risi: Tell me what it is that I do wrong. Well, to begin with, you sing an incredibly offensive song that upsets a lot of actresses in the audience.
[01:04:14] What's the song? I'll show you. I brought a recording of the Oscar telecast back in time with me. You'll be able to see exactly how you ruin the ceremony. We saw your boobs. We saw your boobs. In the movie that we saw, we saw your boobs. Meryl Streep, we saw your boobs in Silkwood. Naomi Watson, Mulholland Drive.
[01:04:37] Angelina Jolie, we saw your boobs in Gia. Alley Berry, we saw them in Monsters Ball Nicole Kidman in Eyes Wide Shut, Marissa Tomei in The Wrestler But we haven't seen Jennifer Lawrence's boobs at all We saw your boobs, we saw your boobs In the movie that
[01:04:55] Adam Cox: I'll be like, yeah, you did. Woo! And then got them out again and shook them to the [01:05:00] camera. Look at these!
[01:05:01] Kyle Risi: I'm Rhonda, and these aren't real!
[01:05:05] Adam Cox: Yeah. So if I ever starred in a Hollywood movie and I got my boobs out, I'd be very grateful for that song.
[01:05:12] Kyle Risi: Yeah, especially if, yeah, good. I think people should be very lucky to see your boobs. Yeah. And Adam, that is the story of the 1989 Oscars, the worst Oscars in history, but the one that gave us so much.
[01:05:25] Adam Cox: Yeah, I guess it's the one that people seem to still talk about. I guess if people are now, they're more comfortable to talk about.
[01:05:31] Kyle Risi: It is a shame that Alan Carr has now died, and he hasn't kind of, like, been appreciated. It's sad. Because this is the thing that killed him, right? He drank himself to death. If he'd still been alive today, he would have been like, Told ya! Do you know what I mean?
[01:05:46] Adam Cox: Yeah.
[01:05:47] Kyle Risi: So yeah.
[01:05:48] Adam Cox: Should we run the outro? Let's do it.
[01:05:49] Kyle Risi: And that's it for another episode of the Compendium Podcast. If you enjoyed today's episode, please follow us on your favorite podcasting app. It really helps us when you do. Next week's episode is available seven days [01:06:00] early on our free access Patreon.
[01:06:02] For more content, subscribe to our Certified Freaks tier for access to our entire backlog of unreleased episodes.
[01:06:09] We release new episodes every Tuesday and until then remember, even in Hollywood, not every fairy tale has a happy ending. Just ask Snow White.
[01:06:20] See you next time.
[01:06:20] Adam Cox: See ya.
