The Playlist: Those of us who live in the LA area were thrown a life wrench with what happened with the fires. In December, it was not something you were thinking you were going to have to incorporate into the show itself. You were also somewhat ucky in the sense that the Grammys and the Fire Aid concert came before you to tackle it first. Did you wait to make your final plans until you saw what those shows did?
Katy Mullan: Well, Raj is the showrunner of the Grammys…[Laughs.] He was doing double duty. He was like, “How do I address it with the Grammys? And then how do we address it with the Oscars?” So he can give you much more of an insight into that for sure. But yeah, I mean it was something that we were all, that no one saw coming and that we spent a lot of time thinking about and making sure that we created exactly the right show for that moment because as you say, things were changing, it was being addressed and there were other platforms for it to be addressed. So, it was really important for us to find just the right tone for our show. But Raj, you should speak to it. You were the one out there in the trenches and the Grammys as well.
Raj Kapoor: I think for the Oscars, we had to address it. Those events impacted our entire city, and yes, people have short attention spans, but there were so many people on our show, from governors on The Academy boards, from crew members to artists, to production team members. There were so many people that were impacted, and whether they lost their homes or other family members did, or friends, or people who had lost their schools, it was just this story that needed to be shared with the rest of the world. And LA still is the epicenter of filmmaking. The Oscars are Hollywood, and now our entire city is hurting, and we’ve gone through this really devastating experience together. But one of the beautiful things I think that happened in this period was how LA came together. We wanted our show to be representative of that, that LA is a community, LA is this beautiful city that we call home, and there have been so many moments that have been created in this city, and there are so many creative people that work here. And so, how do we tell that story? And that started with our little love letter to Los Angeles and our opening film that showed iconic locations and films, and moments that kind of touched your heart. And then we were able to go into our opening performance moment that no longer was a “Wicked” moment, but a celebration of “The Wizard of Oz,” “The Wiz,” and “Wicked” altogether. But really continuing this love letter to Los Angeles, when you hear those lyrics of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and when you hear “Defying Gravity,” it was so representative of the city, kind of building itself up again from the ashes. It was a really kind of beautiful narrative. And then you put together the magic of that music and those stellar performances by Ariana and Cynthia with those vocals that, I think, touched everybody, and being supported by the LA Master Chorale, which we had never had on the show, and they had sung on the soundtrack. It was one of those moments that just gives you all the feels. And so I think in the first eight moments of the show, we hopefully took people on a journey. We addressed these fires, we made them maybe hopefully appreciate a little bit of filmmaking and great moments that have kind of happened in the city, and made them feel some stuff. And then we were able to set Conan up for success and have him come out and absolutely kill it after that.
The Playlist: Let’s talk about the “Wicked” moment. Do the visuals change after the fires? And how early did you commit to Cynthia and Ariana performing “Defying Gravity” together? They had purposefully not performed the song publicly, so we have to assume discussions happened months before?
Raj Kapoor: Yeah, I mean, originally it was we wanted to celebrate “Wicked.” That’s where we first started having conversations, much earlier on. We wanted to have the two artists on our show, and we wanted to create a “Wicked” moment, and then it transitioned to something else. When the fires happened, that idea was then shifted, and it became this: “Yes, we can still celebrate ‘Wicked’ in its own way, but we want to celebrate all of this in a much bigger way.” And it really was a little bit more of a tribute to Los Angeles, and they both responded very well to the creative because we had not sent visuals and stuff for the other idea. We waited, we started to have conversations, but then when the idea came to be, we put together boards, actually in a couple of days. We sent it out to all the teams at Universal and the publicists, and managers. This idea had to happen because it felt perfect. And [musical conductor] Michael Bearden started composing the music the very next day after we pitched it to him, we were pitching it to all our teams, so we would start working on visuals and stuff of what it was going to look like. But it’s one of those ideas that just felt like it had to happen because it just felt right when you listen to those songs and that music, it had all the makings of something that was going to be really good and helpful and maybe a little healing.
The Playlist: I am assuming you guys started planning this participation weeks before the nominations dropped. Were you concerned at all that if it hadn’t, you would have pulled back? Or was it like, “Hey, it’s a big hit, it’s a pop culture moment. We want to just make sure it’s part of the Oscars anyway”?
Katy Mullan: Yeah, very much so.
Raj Kapoor: I think some of these creative conversations were like this is non-nomination dependent. It felt like we just needed to have it on the show. Yeah, but it came together in a unique way. And we actually did not get the full green light till after nominations. We had pitched the idea, but there’s so much going on. Ariana and Cynthia were literally everywhere around the world, and every single award show and film show, and press, I think it was massive. So, we weren’t able to have a real creative discussion until afterwards, but their teams had it before nominations, but we didn’t know that it was happening until after nominations.
The Playlist: The other big number I wanted to talk about was the bond tribute to Eon Productions with three of my favorite artists, Lisa, Doja Cat, and Raye. Oscar voters might not know this, but they have a song together. And when they were announced, I was like, “Oh wow, are they performing the song on the show,” which, hey, I’m all for in future Oscars. But was it a Grammy conversation that, “Hey, they’re available. Do you want to make them part of this?” How did they even get involved in that way?
Raj Kapoor: No. Again, this conversation started very early. We knew that Michael [G. Wilson] and Barbara [Broccoli] were getting a governor’s award. Katy and I went to that particular event, which is lovely, but the conversation started with just us picking. We knew we wanted this to be an all-female lineup, that they were artists that had not necessarily been on the Oscar stage before, kind of artists that had a global impact. They all come from different regions of the world and all speak to different audiences. And we love that the Oscars feel very international in so many ways when you look at what some of the best picture nominees have been in the past few years, and how expansive documentaries are, the Oscars feel more global now more than ever. And I think to have a music moment that helped reflect that was one of our goals. And also thinking about, hey, any of these women could do the next James Bond theme. So that was kind of our thinking. And then the Margaret Qualley piece came a little bit later, and that was one of the fastest, just positive yeses, I think that we’ve ever had. I think it happened in less than 30 minutes. So, it was just like Margaret’s a great dancer. And I texted Mandy Moore, who is our show choreographer this year, and she’s like, “Yeah, Margaret’s amazing.” I was like, “Do you want her in the opening theme part when we do that?” And she’s like, “Yeah, can you get her?” So, I hit up Taryn Hurd, who is our producer and head of talent, and she got to Margaret’s reps, and in less than 30 minutes, it was like, Margaret would love to do this. I was like, “Yes!” So yeah, it was kind of fun. It was like we love having this movie star element with different artists, and yeah, it is been fun to have a little bit of creative license to create some additional moments on the show.
The Playlist: Is there one thing about the show that you were most nervous about?
Katy Mullan: I mean, there were so many, I have to tell you, the Lisa flying harness, was that going to work or not? Was the lift going to work for another moment, which we couldn’t get up some scenery at the end of the show, because that didn’t work? Were we going to have to play people off? Were they going to listen if we played them off? Maybe not. Honestly, from the start of that show until the end of the show, the hardest thing is walking the tight rope between being the time cop and getting the show in on time, and then riding the emotion of the night. So, we don’t want anyone to be there for longer than three and a half hours. Three and a half hours is very, very long to commit to anything. So we feel that responsibility. So literally, I mean, any moment that something wasn’t tight or anything that went over, we were holding on for dear life. It’s a rollercoaster. And I mean, we had amazing speeches, for the most part. We had amazing winners, and that is really what the show is all about. And then everything else we rehearse, and just pray that it goes right. Honestly, we have the best team in the business, the majority of you know that it’s going to be fine, but it is live TV. You just never know.
You can watch the 2025 Academy Awards ceremony on Hulu.
