WGA strike chatter limited at Oscars

Strike receives little attention at Oscars

By DAVE MCNARY

With the writers strike over for a dozen days, the bitter work stoppage stayed very much in the background at Sunday night's Oscar ceremonies.

If not for host Jon Stewart, the strike would have been largelyunacknowledged. And Stewart mostly limited his commentary about it to the top of his opening monologue.

"These past three and a half months have been very tough. The town was torn apart by a bitter writer's strike, but I'm happy to say that the fight is over," Stewart said. "So tonight, welcome to the makeup sex."

Stewart made no mention of the fact that his own "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" returned to the air last month without writers over the objections of the WGA. Indeed, he went out of his way to cast his sympathies with the scribes, noting that "Juno" writer Diablo Cody had taken a pay cut in going from exotic dancing to screenwriting.

"Of course, there's some collateral damage left over from the strike -- emotionally, economically, perhaps worst of all the cancellation of the legendary Vanity Fair Oscar party," he said. "They said they did it out of, quote, respect for the writers. You know a way they could show respect for the writers? Maybe, one day, invite some of them to the Vanity Fair Oscar party. I promise -- they won't mingle."

Stewart also repeated the assertion by WGA leaders that the approach of the Oscars had been an impetus for both sides to get the deal done, then told the audience that they should take a moment to congratulate themselves before switching subjects.

The impact of the strike might have led to more clips being used. Until two weeks ago, when the WGA leadership reached a deal, the look and feel of the Oscarcast had been murky at best -- given the probability that stars would not cross a picket line -- with the presumption that the show would lean heavily on footage from prior shows.

Midway through the show, Stewart noted that had the strike continued, the producers would have been forced to resort to even more clip packages. He then intro'd a pair of salute segments: one for binoculars and periscopes and another for bad dreams with a succession of shots of thesps waking up screaming.

But after that, the elephant in the room became an afterthought and it was almost as if the strike had gone away with two notable exceptions late in the show.

Diablo Cody began her acceptance speech for original screenplay by saying, "This is for the writers, and I want to thank all the writers."

And Helen Mirren tweaked studio execs in her intro for Best Actor nominees.

"Ambition, amorality, greed, deviousness, usury, venality, remorse, nobility, generosity, decency and good old fashioned cojones," she said. "I know these sound like the description to be a successful studio head but these are facets of the performances of our leading actor nominees."

No one else came close to mentioning the WGA strike.

Cody and the Coen brothers had also won their respective WGA awards, but the guild had called off the Feb. 9 ceremony in Los Angeles and merely announced the winners during a low-key "recognition reception" in New York -- a few minutes before the beginning of a WGA membership meeting at the Shrine in downtown Los Angeles to hear details about the deal that would end the strike.

There was also no mention of the prospect of a SAG-AFTRA strike this summer, even though George Clooney and Tom Hanks -- who both served as presenters -- have been pressuring SAG to begin negotiations as soon as possible.