One of life’s great ironies is that the more things change, the more they resemble each other. Or at least a version of each other.
After doing this blog for ten years, I do have several traditions that I like to revisit – first to make it easier to continually pump things out and second because I find that people like tradition and updated versions of certain posts, especially when analogy, metaphor and simile can be taken out behind the woodshed and beaten to a pulp.
But the greatest irony is when actual world events start to feel like some form of tribute to each other or some form of imitation.
This year, as we celebrate yet another Friday the 13th (for the record I am still afraid of both mustard and bees) and I look to do my annual slam-dunk on the Oscars, I look back to last year, asking myself – surely those were more innocent times what with the current excursion (don’t call it a war) into Iran by the United States and Israel.
Surely, they weren’t as fraught with peril as today’s middle eastern chaos and then I come across this sentence:
We are now officially 4 days into Trade War 2.0 TM and I am exhausted.
Well, we are officially 13 days into “Ill-advised Middle-eastern regime change Foray 5.0” and I remain exhausted.
Oil prices are yo-yo’ing around random announcements – will the STriar re-open and be safe or will it remain a commercial kill-zone? Does Donald Trump want low or high oil or gas prices? What will the rest of the world do? How long can Iran hold the global economy hostage before the rest of the OECD band together and collectively retaliate?
What are the polymarket odds on what price for oil gets hit first – $50 or $200. I am currently leaning to $200.
No one knows what’s going on or what’s going to happen, yet everyone has an opinion.
It remains exhausting. And the following bears repeating.
WARS ARE STUPID. Both the tariff and the physical ones.
Fortunately, it’s distraction time. Time to blog about something that is universally loved, especially by people who love to celebrate themselves.
I’m talking about the Academy Awards of course, the Oscars. The big night where the beautiful and smart people in Hollywood get together and celebrate themselves by talking about themselves and giving prizes to each other, all in the hopes that they will get noticed, either while they are preening on the red carpet or at an after-party so they can, of course, talk about themselves some more and how awesome they are.
Come to think of it, maybe the Oscars aren’t all they are cracked up to be. In fact, it is probably the single most self-absorbed night of the year in any industry. Even more annoying than Davos and more self-righteous than a numbered COP summit or Liberal Party Cabinet retreat to discuss themselves and how to not help the middle class.
Hard to believe I used to get together with friends to watch these awards and sit on the edge of my seat desperately hoping that my favourite movie would win Best Sound Design for a Movie Adapted from a Kleenex Commercial or hanging on every word uttered in an acceptance speech by such intellectual luminaries as Sally Field (“you really like me!”) or James Cameron (“king of the world!”).
For the past few years, we haven’t watched, and I won’t be this year because I am travelling. But I may check the results on my phone.
The Oscars lost their mojo years back with a mish-mash of hosts, over-politicization of everything and that one time someone was handed the wrong envelope. Like, who does that? Never mind that the proliferation of self-indulgent arty movies in the nominating categories has made the entire event an exercise in cinematic futility for pretty much anyone except the self-congratulatory “members” of the Academy who clearly get compensated for sitting through a lot of the unwatchable nominated movies.
That’s right. The Academy Awards, the Oscars, have been dead to me since they jumped the shark in 1996 by not inviting back the most glorious host in Oscars history – David Letterman (“Oprah. Uma.”).
So clearly, I am not much of a fan anymore. At least of this particular incarnation of the Oscars. That doesn’t mean that I can’t exploit the awards for personal gain. And that’s because earlier this week (on Tuesday of all days) the real Academy Awards were held and I had the pleasure of attending the ceremonies and I am pleased to report that it was a rip-roaring success.
What Oscars you say? Why the Energy and Other Stuff awards as presented by the Academy of Crude Observations of course. Which strangely has many of the same categories as the actual Academy Awards, just with a bunch of surprising nominees, and winners!
That’s right, it’s The Cruddies!
As a VIP attendee I was privy to the whole event and below is my review. I’ll skip the boring awards of course. No one really cares about Best Drilling Rig or Best Performance by a Pump Jack in Inclement Weather. Those get handed out separately at the nerd show.
But imagine my excitement when I received my formal invitation to attend this exclusive event in person, at a secret location. My VIP ticket arrived by UberEats last week with a tariff free swag package that I ripped open as soon as I got home. Most times, the swag bag is reserved for nominees and presenters (I missed out on that honour) so actually receiving one myself was an early highlight of what was sure to be a special evening.
The contents were of course mostly energy themed and included the following:
- A Tupperware container filled with pre-tariffed bitumen
- An autographed picture of Donald Trump announcing even more tariffs.
- 10 original Encana share certificates
- The deed to an orphaned gas well in Ohio, near where JD Vance grew up
- An autographed copy of the Autopact
- Tickets to an NHL Finals Playoff game in Toronto (feels like a gag gift TBH)
- A copy of the historic Alberta-Canada MOU signed by Mark Carney (wait, what?)
- A vintage Drill Baby Drill banner from a Sarah Palin campaign rally.
- A solar panel
- 1 Dogecoin
Pretty exciting stuff if I may say so myself.
As the day arrived, I found myself strangely filled with a nervous energy I hadn’t felt in a long time. Was it butterflies at the prospect of meeting so many of the luminaries of the energy sector? Maybe it was trepidation at attending an in-person event after all this time of isolation and virtual cocktail hours. Not wanting to be late, I hopped into my car and headed out.
Arriving at the location I tossed my keys to a valet in a blue suit with a red tie (well I thought he was a valet) and headed up the red carpet to the tent, fighting my way through the surprisingly large contingent of paparazzi falling all over themselves to interview an impressive assemblage of energy related luminaries including, among others Murray Edwards’ butler, Danielle Smith, MBS, John Kerry, Vlad Putin (virtual attendee), Rory Johnston, the entire #COM, an Andrew Leach impersonator, Marco Rubio’s oversized Florsheim’s, Mike Rose, Kevin and Neil Young.
By the time I got to my seat the show was just getting underway and this year’s host ensemble of Canadian huckster extraordinaire Kevin O’Leary, sartorially splendiferously dressed Jordan Peterson and sometime American conservative icon, Russia and Iran-loving Nazi apologist Tucker Carlson were doing a fantastic Billy Crystalesque mashup song and dance number introducing this year’s Best Picture nominees, complete with jazz-hands and a burlesque routine. To be honest, this part will likely give me nightmares until the day I die and then stay with me in the afterlife.
Okay, I know you all want me to get to the good stuff – the big awards that everyone wants to hear about and I will. But before we get there we have to get some of the lesser major awards out of the way. Given the length of the show and the mind-numbing boringness of the speeches, I am going to spare everyone the blow by blow narrative and just summarize them by category, winner and notable moments that may have happened. After all, the little people should also get some appreciation, right? Fine, maybe not, but bear with me.
Best Supporting Actress
This year’s nominees included perennial favourite and “politically active” Greta Thunberg for her ongoing efforts to help stem the onslaught of greenhouse gases, former Environment Minister Catherine McKenna for her solo and largely ignored social media efforts to retain any form of relevance or, to be honest, likeability. Also nominated was Elizabeth May, for her continued role in parliament – whatever that actually is. Oddly enough, this is the year that Elizabeth May finally won, although it feels a bit like a lifetime achievement nod in the hopes that she will finally just go away.
Best Supporting Actor – Energy
This one was a battle of the Energy ministers, both of whom brought legit energy world bona fides to their newly minted portfolios as energy czars in two of the most important energy producing countries in the world today. Tim Hodgson parlayed his investment banking expertise and one time starring role in a two man show with Mark Carney into a star-turned secondary role as Mark Carney’s ghost MOU writer. Chris Wright on the other hand played in an ensemble cast of “experts” forced to abandon both principle and fastly held beliefs in the shameless pursuit of personal glory. One a gritty real world performance and the other a spectacular fall from grace. Chris Wright won this one going away.
Best Director
This award goes to the person who shows the greatest skill and leadership in creating and guiding an energy company – national, integrated or pure upstream. Permanent nominees of course include Murray Edwards, MBS and Vladimir Putin. Newly nominated this year was Mike Wirth – CEO of Chevron, nominated due to his uncanny ability to convince Donald Trump to invade Venezuela and kidnap Maduro, thus freeing up Chevron to make money unimpeded by politics. The award ultimately went to Mr. Edwards who as we know was not in attendance and chose not to reveal his location (Monaco) or be near a window or an empty barrel in case either Vlad or MBS was mad about losing.
Best Screenplay/Story Spinning/True or Otherwise
A lot of nominees in this category including, surprisingly, yours truly, although I’m certainly not the favourite since my promotion activities are confined to my job and this blog, making me kind of an indie cult favourite. No, the powerhouse nominees here are Rory Johnston and the Commodity Context Weekly, the Canadian Energy Centre (formerly a war-room) and the no-nonsense reporting of the factsd ma’am seriousness of none other than William Lacey. Last year, Rory was a runaway winner and could have carried the day except Laceyt wore than damn T-shirt again and got a whole bunch of last minute sympathy votes.
Best Actress
This year’s contest featured some pretty compelling performances including Chrystia Freeland as a turncoat government insider who shanks her mentor and political idol in the back in order to lose a popularity contest for new party leader then bails on the new guy for some shiny consulting job in a war-torn country, Danielle Smith (in the correct category) as a social media quitting, energy sector loving, separatist patronizing, lunatic managing, immigrant scapegoating, prime minister baiting salt of the earth woman of the people, in the sleeper hit Mrs. Smith Goes to Edmonton and Melania Trump, for playing Melania… in Melania. This year’s winner was of course Danielle Smith, thanks in no small part to a lack of interest in the other two roles..
Best Actor
Nominees of note in this category were Justin Trudeau who starred with Katy Perry in a madcap adaptation of Black Like Me, Donald Trump starring as the “Chief of Staff” in a remake of the Aaron Sorkin classic The American President and a tour de force performance by everyone’s favourite perpetual Calgary mayoralty candidate Roger Baker in a Canadianized remake of There Will be Blood, telling the take of a former oil and gas CEO crossing to the dark side of the legal profession. A late entrant was new Canadian Prime Minister and condescending boffin Mark Carney in a remake of the Jim Carrey classic Liar Liar.
Best Picture
And then finally we were at the moment of truth. The award of awards. The best picture. Strangely, all of the movies in question had the same titles as the actual Oscar nominees although slightly different plots. Let’s go through them.
Sinners. Set in the Permian, this movie follows two drill-hand brothers who return to Midland only to find it overrun by vampires and other supernatural creatures. With a haunting honky tonk soundtrack, this movie evokes the good times of drilling without the sentimentality of Landman,
One Battle After Another. This “fiction is more real than life” movie is set in an undetermined year in the near future where an impetuous American leader launches a military excursion (not incursion) against Iran only to have it spiral hopelessly out of control – one battle after another
Frankenstein. A mad scientist creates and reanimates a creature only to have it destroy the world as we know. As a musical.
Bugonia. No one knows what this movie is about, but I looked it up. Apparently it’s a sci-fi movie about two employees who kidnap their boss Murray only to find out he is an alien sent to take over the planet.
Hamnet. This one is kind of sad. It is a remake of Hamlet, set in the fictional oil producing country of Fregovia and written by yours truly. Unfortunately, the title was spelled wrong on the poster and the intern who did that has now been sent to Hormuz to be a mine sweeper.
Sentimental Value. A story of an up and coming oil and gas analyst who hangs on to all the reports he has written over the years that were just completely wrong.
F1. A crusty old Internal Combustion engine designer comes back to his origins in the F1 community and together with a retired driver reverses all the absird electrification that seems to have taken over his beloved sport and crashes a bunch of Cadillac test cars in the process.
The Secret Agent. Alberta’s separatist movement has been acting in nefarious fashion for some time and determined to do something about it, Canada’s top spy agency places a secret agent into the organization where he discovers not only a web of lies but a money trail that leads to a very surprising end. People are still talking about the explosive ending cliffhanger.
Marty Supreme. An analyst for a major investment manager makes one prediction too many critical of the political class and is forced into a life on the run with his two pet rabbits. Kevin O’Leary does a star turn as a department store Shamwow salesman.
Train Dreams. Young geophysicist Kevin leads a life of quiet desperation analyzing seismic and other data at Megalomanic Oil Ltd. until one day he is hired to run Alberta’s soon to be built high speed rail system. However he soon realizes he is working for a shadowy organization of billionaires intent on pillaging his beloved province and decides to join them.
This year’s winner was…
The Secret Agent, a movie that no one except the people that worked on it knew anything about or went to. I accepted the award on behalf of… well me. Shh – it may be a true story.
Well, there you have it! After all that excitement, I gathered my belongings and eager to go to the after parties, I left the event early in search of my vehicle, only to discover what I already suspected, there was no valet parking and I had randomly given Donald Trump my vehicle. Ooops! Well at least he’ll be on the hook for the tariffs not me.
As it regards the actual Oscars? I have seen none of the movies nominated. I don’t remember the last movie I went to or watched that wasn’t a Hallmark Christmas movie.
I actually think Barbie should have been renominated this year, because nothing speaks more about the present state of affairs than a plastic doll coming to life and discovering the world is shit.
