Young and Hip Oscars?

Okay, so going in, everybody with a microphone kept talking about how hiring James Franco and Anne Hathaway to host this year's Oscars was an attempt to make it hip and cool and appealing to the younger crowd.  A for effort, but a D for execution.  It looked like it was the writers and director that were young, glaring of a show written by people with no experience writing shows at all.

Case in point, the little historical vignettes.  Nice idea, but having 5 to 10 seconds of dead, orchestra-covered air while some video cue is playing is not going to win you any fans.  The whole thing seemed stilted and forced, and most (but not all) of the truly funny and spontaneous moments came from those who were off script.

• Kirk Douglas.  The man is 94 years old - he can say whatever the hell he wants and take as long as he wants.  And he was loving every second of it.

• His exchange with Melissa Leo when he gave her her award.  "Pinch me!"  "Mine?"  "What are you doing later on?"

• Melissa Leo dropping an F-bomb on live, worldwide TV. Sadly, the prudish American networks were running on a time delay, and only the rest of us got to see an uncensored, truly historic Oscar moment.

• James Franco dressed as Marilyn Monroe.  It's sad to say, but he had better looking breasts in that dress than a lot of the women there did. 

• Colin Firth threatening to well up into interpretive dance.

It wasn't an unpleasant visit to Hollywood, but certainly a boring one.  I had a better time sitting for two hours, waiting in line to see The Tonight Show.  I'll be the first to admit I don't know what the answer is to a bigger and better show, but with this many people on the case, they've got to be able to figure something out before they become completely redundant.