Is Oscar a Bulletproof Brand?

Welcome to the 77th and last Oscars. ~Chris Rock

As we await the 88th Academy Awards, let us consider the indestructibility of one of the world's most trusted brands, an imprimatur that bestows millions of dollars on winners (or hundreds of thousands of dollars if you're a woman winner), even though it is often given to ordinary people.

Oscar has no competitors. The Golden Globe Awards are aperitifs that whet the appetite for the main course. Guild awards do nothing more than slightly alter Oscar odds. The Independent Spirit Awards, in its cheerful celebration of diversity, would shame Oscar if Oscar could be shamed. 

Pride, sloth, greed, lust, gluttony, wrath and envy, none of the deadly sins can kill Oscar.

Oscar is the only brand capable of turning the deadly sins into a chronic non-lifethreatening disease. It's competitive strategy is simple: stay out of mischief. But mischief has a way of finding it because the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is an organization of roughly 6,200 members with a peculiar world view. Old white and male is the usual characterization of the Academy's membership, but like hot dogs and Twinkies, it's best not to know Oscar's ingredients.

Bill Mumy is a proud member of the Academy. Bill Mumy is better known for being Lost in Space on television than for finding the perfect role on film.

The Academy won't divulge its membership list but the studios know who the members are because they send them lavish gift boxes containing nominated movies and other trinkets.

Established in 1927 as an industry organization to consolidate power against unions, the Academy has always favoured brute commerce over resolute art. No movie or actor can win without a multi-million dollar campaign. This year Leonardo DiCaprio lusts after the Oscar that has been denied him since 1991 when he appeared in Critters 3. This Oscar season the notoriously publicity shy actor has been seen everywhere from Davos to Ellen. 

I'm here to explain why black people will never be nominated for anything.

Richard Pryor said that way back in 1977. 2016 is not the first year that race relations have taken centre stage at the Academy Awards. In 1996, Jesse Jackson threatened to disrupt the awards with a demonstration protesting Oscar's whiteness, until producer Quincy Jones and emcee Whoopi Goldberg convinced him that he would be hurting his fellow African Americans. Today Cheryl Boone Isaacs, an African American woman, is President of the Academy, but the Academy is much bigger than she is. Her impotent concern at the dearth of diversity in the list of nominees proves that she is the scientist overseeing a petri dish of human behaviour over which she has little control.

Perhaps the Academy's greatest sin as it relates to diversity is sloth. Academy members don't have to watch the movies the Academy sends them to consider for nomination. Beasts of No Nation, a tiny brilliant film with no Marketing Miracle of Miramax behind it (Miramax turned The English Patient and Shakespeare in Love into Oscar winners) was overlooked because few members bothered to watch it.

Nobody overlooks the Oscar gift baskets. What began twenty years ago as a small enticement to get younger stars to attend the awards has ballooned into a gluttonous grab bag of riches for the rich. Which brings us to the show. Once a year Oscar puts on a three-hour extravaganza with the exacting logistics of a missile launch carrying a cargo of combustible egos. One year, a technician fell asleep in the rafters of the Shrine auditorium and couldn't be revived. As a result, Madonna's dramatic pop up mic couldn't pop up.

Here's what happened when someone broke the news to her...

Every Academy Awards show has at least one wrathful Madonna moment that threatens to derail the show. 

It killed him...the reaction to that show really killed him. ~Michael Seligman referring to Oscar producer Allan Carr

Oscar can be deadly, not to Oscar, but to the people who make mistakes that nobody forgets. Producer Allan Carr was devastated by the savage reaction to the 12-minute production number featuring Rob Lowe and Snow White that opened the 61st Academy Awards. Immediately after the show, Disney sued the Academy for using Snow White without permission and for putting the virginal icon in the arms of a libidinous man who had been recently exposed in a series of home videos.  

Allan Carr died a few years later at age 62, remembered more kindly in retrospect for his bold vision and for introducing one tiny change to the show that has made a big difference. He changed "And the winner is..." to "And the Oscar goes to..."  80 percent of nominees aren't losers. They just didn't get the Oscar.

Not getting the Oscar is far worse than being a loser.

Oscar has a storied 88-year history, a collection of acting greats and magic moments that grows in prestige with every passing year. The people who hold Oscar in their hands hold more than a smooth naked man worth $690 in 24-karat gold. They hold the promise of immortality. Winning an Oscar makes even the most jaded celebrities starstruck. Each Oscar winner is assigned a sherpa to take them to the press room because most are too disoriented by the life-altering experience to navigate.

Leonardo DiCaprio doesn't want an Oscar. He wants eternal life. No other brand can make so many believe in miracles borne of sin, and that, ladies and gentlemen of the LinkedIn Academy, is why Oscar is indestructible.  

Having 'Oscar winner' on your tombstone is a great thing. ~George Clooney

About the Author. Who cares about the author when the topic is the Academy Awards? Here's a reading list for the seven deadly Oscar sins.

A study in Oscar ENVY: Zadie Smith's Ten Notes on Oscar Weekend

An essay seething with Oscar WRATH: Annie Proulx's Blood on the Red Carpet

A dip into Oscar GLUTTONY: GQ on what's in this year's $230,000 gift bag

The wages of Oscar PRIDE: The Hollywood Reporter on the "Huh?" of Academy membership.

The brand value of Oscar GREED: The Huffington Post on Oscarnomics.

The SLOTH of Oscar voters: The Hollywood Reporter reports that 6% of Academy members did not see all last year's nominated films.

Leonardo's LUST: Adweek

ALL THE DEADLY OSCAR SINS in one book: Steve Pond's The Big Show: High Times and Dirty Dealings Backstage at the Academy Awards 

Hold on...Madonna's grabbed the mic.