I had the pleasure this afternoon to speak with Ian Drew, Senior Editor (for music) for the magazine Us Weekly, to talk about music about this weekend's Oscars.
As we all know, there are only two songs nominated in Best Original Song: "Man or Muppet" from "The Muppets" and "Real in RIO" from "RIO."
"I was pretty infuriated with only two songs," Drew said. Even more, he added, "The two nominated were not very good." With no fewer than nine films being nominated for Best Picture, the Academy should have at least bended the rules, if need be, to have the usual five or so songs nominated, Drew said.
Drew would have liked to have seen Mary J. Blige's song "Living Proof" off "The Help" soundtrack be nominated — or even win — but although she was nominated for a Golden Globe for the song, she was not nominated for an Oscar. "I was expecting this to be a highlight of Mary's career," Drew said of his assumption that she would be nominated for an Academy Award.
Also disturbing Drew is that none of the nominated songs will be performed during the Oscar telecast, thus eliminating the chance for the broadcast to provide more entertainment value. "I predict it will be a boring ceremony," Drew said. It is a big mistake to nix music during the telecast, because the telecast needs more fun TV moments to avoid the pitfalls viewers experienced last year as they were subjected to the train wreck that was James Franco co-hosting, he said.
