Hollywood’s biggest night is here, and the 92nd Academy Awards kicked off in style!
Following an incredible opening performance by Janelle Monáe, comedians Chris Rock and Steve Martin took the stage to start off the night. But don’t be confused—these two weren’t the official hosts, as the Academy opted to go without one for the second year in a row, and Steve made sure to acknowledge the change.
“You know, I was thinking today, Chris, that we both have hosted the Oscars before and this is such an incredible demotion,” Steve joked. “They don’t really have hosts anymore. Why is that?”
“Twitter,” Chris replied. “Everybody’s got an embarrassing tweet somewhere. I know I do.”
The two comedians also touched on some political topics in their opening monologue. After Steve cut Chris off while he was talking about L.A.’s homeless population, Chris moved on to another hot-button topic.
“Mahershala Ali is here tonight. He has two Oscars,” Chris began. “You know what that means when the cops pull him over? Nothing.”
And of course, the duo couldn’t pass up an opportunity to mention that not a single female was nominated in the Best Director category. “There’s so many — so many great directors nominated this year,” Chris began. To which Steve replied, “I don’t know, Chris, I thought there was something missing from the list this year.”
“Vaginas?” Chris joked to audible laughter from the audience. The camera panned to Greta Gerwig, who seemed to take the joke in stride.
But Cynthia Erivo seemed a bit confused when Chris and Steve turned their attention to her. “Cynthia did such a great job in “Harriet” hiding black people that the academy got her to hide all the black nominees,” Chris joked. “Cynthia, is Eddie Murphy under this stage?”
Cynthia responded with a shrug and a laugh!
The comedic duo continued to address the lack of diversity in the awards ceremony. When talking about how much the Academy Awards have changed over the years, Steve said, “In 1929, there was no black acting nominees.”
“Now, in 2020, we got one,” Chris replied.
The two snuck in one last joke at the end of their speech. “Well, we’ve had a great time not hosting tonight,” Steve said before Chris introduced Regina King to announce the first award of the night.
Needless to say, these funnymen kicked off the show with a bang!