‘All these normal people, packed into a human lasagne’: my glamour-free night at the Oscarsn

"While the cameras lingered on the stars in Los Angeles, thousands of non-celebrities were whooping it up in the Dolby theatre’s cheap seats. I was one of them

Once seated in our mezzanine, it became clear that no one at home would be able to see what we were doing. So, at the normal people Oscars, people can do whatever they like. They might talk through awards, or constantly text people, or misjudge the tone by yelling: “Holy shit, is that Andrea Bocelli?!” during the In Memoriam segment. In the case of the woman sitting next to me, it meant spending the whole ceremony scrolling through the billions of red carpet selfies you took on your way in. Doesn’t matter. These are the normal people Oscars. No one can see us. There are no rules.

But then something changed. An extraordinarily friendly woman sat next to me and informed me that her daughter had been nominated. It turned out that she was the mother of a production designer from one of the bigger films of the night. The pride bursting out of this woman was incredible. She listed all the films on which her daughter had worked and explained how her daughter had been mentored by another nominee.

This woman was so relentlessly enthusiastic about her child that I found myself rooting for her, too. Suddenly, I had skin in the game. This made an enormous difference. "

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‘All these normal people, packed into a human lasagne’: my glamour-free night at the Oscars | Oscars 2024 | The Guardian: