Overview
With the 89th Academy Awards here again, we're at once proud and legally hesitant to again bring you Concrete Playground's Annual Oscars Drinking Game. Play by the rules, and by the time the Best Visual Editing in a Foreign Animated Short Documentary category comes around*, you'll be dancing on tables better than Gosling and Stone could ever dream of. As always, Concrete Playground encourages both the responsible consumption of alcohol, and the soonest-possible-end to all reboots of movies that were fine the first time round. Read up on our predictions and settle in for a big Monday afternoon.
ONE SIP (EVERGREEN OSCAR STAPLES)
- Anyone makes a President Trump joke.
- Jack Nicholson wears sunglasses.
- Diane Keaton wears gloves.
- Harrison Ford wears an earring.
- Jennifer Lawrence does something adorably "real" (three sips if it's a fashion mishap).
- Leo brings his mother as his date.
- Winner thanks God or Jesus.
- Winner's speech is played off by the orchestra.
- Winner pays tribute to his/her extraordinary fellow nominees.
- Winner describes his/her film as "important".
- Winner describes his/her film's director as "a genius" and/or "visionary".
TWO SIPS (THE OSCARS ARE PREDICTABLE)
- Anyone makes an almost-President Hilary joke.
- Kimmel jokes that one day, thanks to advances in technology, translators like Amy Adams' character in Arrival might be able to decipher some sort of intelligence from President Trump's tweets.
- Whenever you catch yourself humming 'City of Stars' after it's performed during the ceremony.
- When the cast and crew of La La Land are invited to look under their seats to find a complimentary Oscar already taped to the bottom.
- Whenever Ben Affleck smiles, but remains dead behind those cold, joyless eyes.
- Nicole Kidman rocks up with her hair in the killer '80s 'do from Lion.
- The Manchester By The Sea video package depresses everyone so profoundly they all just pack up and go home.
- Nobody can figure out how to remove the default nominee settings of 'Steven Spielberg' or 'John Williams' from the teleprompter, so both men are named as contenders for Best Supporting Actress (three sips if one of them wins).
- Whilst presenting an award, DiCaprio plays it all cool as if Oscars don't really matter anyway.
- Alicia Vikander offers words of inspiration to all nominees from the Best Actress category by proving you can win for drama and finally graduate to playing Lara Croft like you always dreamed of.
THREE SIPS (IF MOVIE STARS WERE INTERESTING PEOPLE)
- Anyone makes a President Nixon joke.
- Trump actually does tweet about the Oscars while they're happening.
- Meryl Streep turns up with a band of sherpas carrying all her previous Academy Awards.
- Dev Patel wins Best Supporting Actor and immediately does a flawless impersonation of whoever presents him with the award.
- A congratulatory kiss or embrace from the presenter "gets awkward".
- You've actually seen one of the nominees for Documentary Short Subject.
- Lady Gaga abseils onto stage for no apparent reason and hangs suspended for the remainder of the evening.
- Suicide Squad wins for Best Makeup and Hairstyling, resulting in a world-ending vortex as soon as the first person utters the words: "Academy Award-Winning Film Suicide Squad".
FINISH YOUR DRINK (WOULD BE TREMENDOUS)
- Anyone makes a President Martin Van Buren joke.
- I Am Not Your Negro wins Best Documentary (Feature), but never receives the award after the progressive white presenter doesn't know if it's okay to say the title aloud.
- After winning the Best Actress award for Jackie, Natalie Portman jokes about 'a more preferable Presidential assassination' and is promptly taken down by the Secret Service.
- Someone forgets to thank Harvey Weinstein, so he summons a 50-foot demon and begins stealing the souls of everyone present.
- To prove he's no longer an anti-Semite, Mel Gibson instead goes on a tirade about Sentinelese tribesmen.
* If at any stage you believe this is actually a legitimate category, put the drinks down — you've played hard enough.
Tom Glasson is one of Concrete Playground's senior film writers and a regular Oscars Drinking Game participant. You can read his reviews here, here and here.