Oscars 2024 is less than a month away and the Academy has begun releasing interesting promotional material. Jimmy Kimmel is ripping the "Barbie" parody band-aid a full month before the Oscars.
The promo video shows Jimmy in a tuxedo, as he lands up in Barbieland and takes help from Kate McKinnon's Weird Barbie. She shows him a map of all the films he must encounter on his way back to Hollywood, where he can host the show. As they hop into her wagon, they meet the even weirder Barbie: Emma Stone's Bella from "Poor Things".
They visit the Osage County of "Killers of Flower Moon", where they grow Italians in fields. They also go to Los Alamos from "Oppenheimer" and witness a 'very ugly man' (Matt Damon, who has a long, fake beef with Kimmel).
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Finally, they land in Hollywood, but Jimmy is still too nervous about hosting the ceremony. Worry not, America Ferrera has just the speech to motivate him. At the end, Ryan Gosling pops out of the car with the celebratory In-and-Out takeaway order. Jimmy tells him that only winners eat In-and-Out, but Ryan is confident their director, Greta Gerwig has Best Director in the bag. America tells him Greta is not even nominated and he lets out a big, long scream. On February 12, many Oscar nominees came together for the annual luncheon at Beverly Hilton hotel in Los Angeles. Greta Gerwig and Margot Robbie, whose snubs for best director and best actress, respectively, for "Barbie" caused a major stir, both showed up for the nominations they did get, and were all smiles.
Greta Gerwig, nominated for adapted screenplay, was surrounded by selfie-seekers as soon as she entered the banquet hall while Robbie, up for best picture as a "Barbie" producer, beamed nearby as she hugged and chatted with a woman who got one of the best actress spots, Sandra Hüller of "Anatomy of a Fall".
Greta and Robbie got some of the loudest cheers of the afternoon when their names were called during the class picture roll call, which feels like a school commencement and is perhaps the day's most egalitarian tradition. The names are read, and nominees are called up to risers in an order that seems to make no accounting for fame.