Norm Kinard, the owner of Highland Parking and Transportation. (Image Courtesy: Norm Kinard)
The Oscars are so dazzling, so elegant, so ... logistical. For every bit of glamour, there's a lot more going on behind the scenes.
We spoke to four people working in various corners of the industry and asked them what they're doing in the day leading up to the big night.
- The day before -
Norm Kinard owns Highland Parking and Transportation, and he's the official transportation coordinator for the ceremony. He's responsible for orchestrating 500 valeted cars, 650 limos and 35 employee shuttles.
Kinard's Oscars "workday" begins around midnight Saturday night, and he won't clock out until the Monday morning following the show.
He doesn't have to worry about the procession to the Dolby Theatre - that's the purview of the Department of Transportation. But he does have a meticulous schedule of what needs to happen when. The night before, he makes sure that garages near the ceremony are emptiedand ready for a vehicular onslaught and that equipment is in place. And he makes certain that employees are ready to go with the necessary paperwork and parking passes.
The quest for perfect skin is a year-round endeavor in Hollywood, but awards season is a particularly popular time to be at Kate Somerville.
According to A-list facialist Kelly Viavattine, who works at the Melrose Place boutique, all of the more invasive procedures take place a week or more in advance of the ceremony - you know, the acne treatments and blemish extractions, even the nonsurgical facelift. The day before is all about last-minute touch-ups.
"You want to get (those) treatments as close to the awards ceremony as possible," Viavattine explains. They include a hydration therapy called the DermalQuench, during which an aesthetician uses a machine to spray serum onto a client's face, while pushing the liquid into the skin using pure oxygen.
It's supposed to "temporarily hide fine lines and wrinkles," she says. "It's a really great palette for the make up artists."
Sound editor Alan Robert Murray's nomination for
Sicario this year is his eighth, and he's won twice.
"The pressure of getting ready for it and the wife going out and buying a dress and all that prep work gets tension-filled sometimes, but once you get in the limo and you're heading to the Oscars, it's a Cinderella type feeling," he says.
Oscars talent producer Taryn Hurd started recruiting presenters and musical guests in earnest last summer. There's no perfect formula for selecting people. It's certainly a boon to find someone with a big Twitter presence to help get free publicity; then again, it's not like Hurd is going to overlook someone like Cate Blanchett, who has no social media footprint whatsoever.
This year's list is eclectic; Sarah Silverman and Louis C.K. will take the stage alongside presenters who are best known abroad, like Bollywood actress and
Quantico lead Priyanka Chopra and Korean superstar Byung-hun Lee. (Also Read:
Stop Press. Priyanka Chopra Will be Presenting at the Oscars This Year)
Hurd's most chaotic stretch is the Saturday before the show. Every presenter comes in and gets 15 minutes to go over his or her script with producers, make changes if needed (which rarely happens, thankfully) then practice onstage with a teleprompter.
"It's literally every 15 minutes all day long until we go into our dress rehearsal that night," she says. "It's a pretty surreal day."
- The morning of -
One item on Kinard's long checklist: party planning. Or, more specifically, setting up the limousine holding area at the Hollywood Bowl, where all the drivers meet up after dropping off attendees. They're fed a catered meal and watch the ceremony on televisions. "It's important for them to understand whether or not their client won," Kinard explains. "This might dictate what after-parties their clients go to." And no doubt what their moods will be like.
Viavattine is always booked solid on ceremony day. The clinic opens at 10 and she can expect six to eight appointments, most of which are either the oxygen treatment or another option involving LED lights that "perks up" the skin.
There was one year when an awards show presenter showed up "with like a million dollars worth of jewels in an envelope and this orange spray tan." To be clear, the terrible tan came from another establishment, and the woman came to get it off.
"We were scrubbing her body down with ExfoliKate trying to get this tan off," she recalls. "It was a nightmare for her but we got it off, and she looked great."
Hurd is at the Dolby Theatre in time for yet another rehearsal, at 10 a.m. After that, she has one last meeting before everyone breaks to get ready.
Right before the limo comes, Murray rushes to write a speech in case he wins. (He tends to put it off.)
- Minutes before -
A little bit of panic sets in. Kinard says he stands by the road alternately looking at his watch and the traffic, hoping things are moving smoothly - albeit slowly, through security checkpoints - and clearing up in time for the opening monologue.
"That's the point where it's always a little stressful," he says. "But then the call comes in and you hear that the streets are looking good and you look at your watch and there's 10 to 15 minutes to spare and you're OK."
Hurd, meanwhile, stands on the red carpet mentally checking off who has arrived, looking for (at the very least) her first four or five acts. She's never had an issue with a presenter missing a cue at the Oscars, but she hasn't been so lucky on other awards shows.
"I've done a live television show where someone was stuck in traffic and missed (presenting) their award altogether," she recalls. "So you're running out into the house and you're asking someone else who's there to jump in and fill in last minute."
Murray, however, has already arrived. There's no red carpet procession or Mani-Cam for the sound editors, so he has to get there early. And the traffic is no joke.
"By the time you're coming up Highland, they have all these concrete roadblocks, then they X-ray the whole limo," he says, "so by the time you get out of the car, you're kind of like, 'finally.'" Luckily there are appetizers and an open bar waiting for him.
- During the ceremony -
For Kinard, the show is actually halftime - the moment to start thinking about departures. He can expect two waves of attendees leaving: the first just after the ceremony ends and another after the Governors Ball winds down.
Hurd spends the show backstage, hovering around the green room, making sure everyone's happy and putting out fires as needed.
Murray may end up onstage, in which case he'll be staring at a countdown clock and hoping he doesn't leave out someone important, which is what happened last year. He won for
American Sniper and had planned to thank Chris Kyle's widow, Taya, but opted instead to cut his speech short. He didn't realize she was in the audience that night.
"That's kind of haunted me ever since then," he says.
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