• Home

Yup, she’s back!

All’s well that E(ll)ens well.

Now that the wonderfully entertaining Ellen DeGeneres has been called in to host the Academy Awards ceremony in 2014 , we are very much looking forward to an elegant evening of gentle, non-threatening humour that is in good taste and with malice towards none. This is her second turn at conducting the prestigious and much-awaited evening that is quite the highpoint of life in Hollywood and it was a delight to hear what she had to say at this rare honour.

“I am so excited to be hosting the Oscars for the second time,” DeGeneres said in a statement. “You know what they say — the third time’s the charm.”

Now that the organisers of the event has gone ahead and put their full weight behind making the 2014 event, a largely all-woman event, — Hollywood marketing maven Cheryl Boone Isaacs has recently been elected as the first African American president of the 6,000-member Academy— we expect the evening to be less testosterone driven and dancing to a mellower tune.

Last year’s host, Seth MacFarlane managed to get a number of Hollywood biggies hot under the collar, raised many a well-plucked eyebrow and caused furrows to appear on carefully maintained baby-smooth foreheads, with his not-very-tasteful jokes. It did not help that there were plenty of references to nudity on screen that left many a leading lady red-faced.

We are not saying Ellen will stay clear of subjects that might embarrass the celeb guests but we are saying she will bring a woman’s touch to it so that no one goes home with their egos bruised or squirm in their seats. We know no one with a sharper tongue, a razor-sharp wit or an amazingly spot-on sense of humour and so we think she is mightily eligible to host the 2014 show.

And we see a lot more fun happening on stage when Ellen is up there rubbing shoulders with the stars. The comedienne, who once famously got US President Barack Obama to show off his dance moves on her show, is likely to have the carefully and expensively dressed men and women in the audience to loosen up a bit. And possibly sing with her too.

And just one more last and very important reason we love her. She did not forget to mention her significant other while shouting out her thanks to the Academy for giving her this remarkable honour: “I’d like to thank @The Academy, my wife Portia and, oh dear, there goes the orchestra,” she tweeted .

This is one show we must watch, come what may…

sudhamenon2006@gmail.com