From ordering pizza for Kerry Washington to tweeting a record-breaking selfie, Ellen Degeneres kept the Academy Awards young and fresh on Sunday night.
43.7 million viewers watched the show, according to deadline.com.
While last year’s Oscars were a tad dry and uninteresting for people under the age of 30 (sorry, Billy Crystal), Ellen drew in a younger demographic with various social media references and jokes about the Southern California weather.
Throughout the show, she used a Samsung tablet to take selfies with celebrities and live-tweet about every person she met. Halfway through the show, Ellen tried to take a picture with Meryl Streep, telling her “Let’s make this the most retweeted picture on Twitter.” Other actors jammed into the shot, with Bradley Cooper holding the tablet, and Jared Leto, Jennifer Lawrence, Julia Roberts, Channing Tatum, Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, and Kevin Spacey all cramming into the background.
Thanks to Ellen, this picture is now the legendary selfie that shut down Twitter. For nearly fifteen minutes, Twitter was unable to open as a result of traffic overload. Within 2 hours, there were over 2 million retweets. With that many retweets, Ellen nearly quadrupled President Barack Obama’s previous record of 500k retweets after his second inauguration.
Additionally, Ellen ordered 99 boxes of pizza from a local Los Angeles pizza joint for the audience. The amount of pizza was worth over $1,500, according to Seamless.
Sophomore Nikki Ahazie said, “If Ellen was to host again, I’d like it. Ellen has a positive attitude, and she knows how to make jokes that are appealing to people. My favorite part was the end, when the director of 12 Years a Slave gave his speech.”
The winners were all well-deserving of their Oscars. Jared Leto, who starred in Dallas Buyers Club as a transexual woman, earned his Academy Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role. Matthew McConaughey, also from Dallas Buyers Club, won Best Actor for his lead role in the movie.
McConaughey shed nearly fifty pounds for his role as an AIDS-stricken Texas man, while Leto remained in character for the entire length of the production. “Matthew McCoughnahey’s speech was so good. He speaks so well. He lost so much weight for that movie, and that’s pretty [expletive] amazing. That’s ridiculous,” junior Danielle Thomas said.
Leto dedicated his speech to those fighting in Ukraine and Venezuela, and those suffering with HIV/AIDS around the world.
12 Years a Slave won Best Picture, and Lupita Nyong’O from the winning movie earned the Best Actress in a Supporting Role award.
Gravity earned 7 Oscars for technicalities like visual effects and sound editing.
Ellen Degeneres increased viewership from younger film fans, saving what could have been another boring Hollywood awards show. Each win was well deserved, with surprisingly few upsets.
