Brew the coffee, strike out the amphetamines and the matchsticks for the eyes, discard the cilice (watch the spikes don’t blind the dog) – it’s the night of exquisite and prolonged torture for dedicated film-worshippers throughout the world.

It’s the Oscars, topped and tailed by hours of ersatz fawning by people who, behind the smiles and designer masks, hate the talent and wish they had the wherewithal to be them.

This one is going to be different, of course. It’s been “pandemicised” although the organisers aren’t coughing (Covid nudge, nudge) about the details of how it will unfold. Although, for sure, it will be at length.

In a letter to Oscar nominees, the producers – director Steven Soderbergh, Stacey Sher and Jesse Collins – said that “the plan is to stage an intimate, in-person event at Union Station in Los Angeles, with additional show elements live from the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood”.

I get the symbolism of Union Station – a grand architectural mix of Art Deco, Mission Revival and Streamline Moderne, which somehow works – which was built on the bulldozed ground of what was until then Chinatown, itself constructed on the ruins and artefacts of an Indian village. This is clearly a subtle comment on America’s brutal past, and also Hollywood’s, where, until recently, white actors redded- or yellowed-up for the parts.

Certainly less direct than when Marlon Brando refused an Oscar for his part on The Godfather in 1973 and sent along a “squaw”, actress Sacheen Littlefeather, to tell the Academy he was protesting about Hollywood’s portrayal of Native Americans. Italians escaped his censure.

It could also be an analogy about the interminable length of the evening’s journey to the final awards. Amtrak, the US rail company, runs out of Union Station operating some of the world’s slowest trains in the world’s most advanced country. A journey from LA to San Diego, 120 miles, takes three hours, and north along the 180-mile line to San Luis Obispo, over five hours. Wagon trains went almost as fast. The Pony Express certainly did.

Contrast this with the 1st Academy Awards in May 1929, hosted by Douglas Fairbanks. It was all over in 15 minutes. Today acceptance speeches last just about as long.

A proto-Weinstein

THE Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences had been created two years earlier by the notorious and unscrupulous Louis B Mayer, whose motive, he said, was that if he “hung medals” on filmmakers they would do exactly what he wanted. He was also a prototypical Harvey Weinstein. He groped a teenage Judy Garland and his interview technique with potential actresses was to have them sit on his lap with his hands on their breasts.

The Oscar was originally called the Academy Award of Merit, hardly a star-spangled moniker. It was designed by Mayer’s art director Cedric Gibbons and made by sculptor George Stanley, allegedly modelled on the Mexican actor Emilio ‘El Indio’ Fernandez, although it’s difficult to see the similarities. Fernandez played sombreroed, sneering Mexican ne’er-do-wells in films by Sam Pekinpah, such as The Wild Bunch and Bring Me The Head of Alfredo Garcia.

He wasn’t just an actor but an acclaimed director in Mexico, although he didn’t take kindly to criticism, and his life also dramatically melded into acting. After completing one movie he invited Mexico City’s most prominent film critics to dinner at his estancia to view his new picture. After many drinks, no doubt, the critics were invited by Fernandes to give their reviews to him.

All of them praised it lavishly until one young man stood up and said that, after consideration, it wasn’t a worthy addition to the great auteur’s oeuvre. El Indio reacted in the way that any censured artiste can only dream – he produced a revolver from under his coat and shot the critic dead.

The good news is that he only spent a short time in jail and no-one recalls the name of the critic. The Oscar, whether or not it resembles El Indio (and who would have told him that it didn’t!), is cast as a golden, sword-wielding crusader for the arts. It stands 13.5 inches tall and weighs just under 10 pounds. It’s only 24-carat gold plate on top of bronze and you can’t buy one on Ebay because the Academy insists that it can only be sold back to them for $1.

Oscar’s naked truth

THE prize became officially the Oscar in 1939, although there are competing narratives over who came up with the name. The best one, although it probably isn’t true, comes from Bette Davis who claimed that she came up with it because it reminded her of her husband’s naked bum coming out of the shower. He was Harmon Oscar Nelson Jnr of the taut toosh.

It probably originated from either the Academy librarian Margaret Herrick, who said it reminded her of her uncle Oscar, or an LA gossip writer called Sidney Skolsky, who used it sneeringly about Oscar Hammerstein Snr, a Broadway theatre owner and father of the lyricist Oscar Jnr.

Young Oscar Hammerstein is the only Oscar to win an Oscar. Two, in fact, for The Last Time I Saw Paris and It Might As Well Be Spring.

The overwhelming favourite to scoop the awards this year – best picture, actor, director, screenplay et al – with 10 nominations, is Mank, about Herman J Mankiewicz writing Citizen Kane. It’s in black and white, available on Netflix, with Gary Oldman playing the character, for most of the film with a broken leg. The film is entirely bereft of sex, whizzbangs and car chases, so it’s an unlikely leading contender. Mank was an alcoholic who died at the age of 55. He had a fairly low view of Hollywood. Writing to his friend Ben Hecht, who also features in the film, he summarised: “Millions are to be grabbed out here and your only competition is idiots. Don’t let this get around.”

It Gary Oldman doesn’t win it could be Riz Ahmed (Sound of Metal), another Brit, who would be the first Muslim to win one, or Welshman Anthony Hopkins (The Father) who would be the oldest recipient at 83.

Frances McDormand is the favourite for best actress in a leading role for Nomadland, where she plays a woman who has lost everything – job, husband – and travels around the States, rootless, in a campervan. I’d give it to her right now just for being her.

Seventh heaven

THE only other one of this year’s crop I’ve seen is The Trial Of The Chicago 7, highly recommended, in which Sacha Baron Cohen is nominated for best supporting actor. I knew one of the real lawyers, Len Weinglass.

Still name-dropping, I have a friend who is an Oscar winner. Julie Christie won as best actress for Darling in 1966. She certainly didn’t show it off. When I stayed for a few nights in her flat in Notting Hill years ago, while she was away, I finally noticed it. It was used as a door stop.

The real prize is the financial one – the hike in fees and bankability with the win. When Tom Hanks won the Oscar for Philadelphia in 1994, his salary went up almost 100%, to $10 million. In Saving Private Ryan he made $40m, in salary and profit participation.

This is bounty to come for those who clutch the gold statue and give thanks to everyone in their tearful acceptance speech – mother, cast, agent, God, rarely good fortune or the casting couch. Or, if you’re Matthew McConaughey, you’re a little more honest and thank yourself, as he did for the 2014 Oscar in Dallas Buyers Club. If you want to make a point about ageism you can follow what Jack Palance did in 1992 by doing one-arm press ups, although probably not without a defibrillator nearby.

The tears, the glamour, the glitches, the songs, the speeches, the trains and Union Station can be seen live on Sky Cinema and NOW, and online at

ABC.com.

The ceremony starts around 1am our time and finishes at about 5am, or later depending on the verbosity of the speeches. Don’t wake me.