by You know the drill. It’s the Oscars. The stars descend on a red carpet to pose in their glitz and glam before finding out who’s won some of the industry’s top awards. But not this year.
The 95th Academy Awards tried something different for 2023, swapping out the usual red carpet for such events with a cream-colored one for the first time in over 60 years.
The academy has chosen a supposedly champagne-colored carpet for the celebrity entrance, but not everyone is on board.
Creative consultants Lisa Love, a longtime Vogue contributor, and Raúl Àvila, creative director of the Met Gala, cited the idea of making the mid-afternoon event feel more like an evening (in line with the elegant code of black tie attire) as one of the reasons behind the change.
“We’ve turned a daytime event into nighttime,” Love told the Associated Press. “It’s evening, even though it’s still 3:00.”
Love said she experimented with other, darker colors before settling on the champagne hue to help turn arrivals into an evening event.
“We chose this beautiful, saffron-colored sienna that evokes the sunset, because this is the sunset before the golden hour,” she explained.
Even the famous walkway was covered this year, in part to protect attendees and cameras from the elements.
But not everyone has embraced the change, and he’s already become the butt of many jokes, including one from Oscars host Jimmy Kimmel at Thursday’s inauguration ceremony, in one of many references to last year’s infamous slapstick.
“I think the decision to go for a champagne carpet over a red carpet shows how confident we are that no blood will be spilled,” he joked.
Best Supporting Actress winner Jamie Lee Curtis had the best reaction ahead of Sunday night’s ceremony, leading to a Chirping to express his views in a way we can all relate to.
“Apparently, at the @TheAcademy Oscars, their carpet will match my curtains,” she wrote, adding a “facial palm” emoji.
Elsewhere, the color change led many people on social media to say that the “champagne”-colored carpet was, well, beigeand others couldn’t help but point out how filthy it was after hours of foot traffic from LA’s well-heeled celebrities.
And that’s not even taking into account the weeks of making the outfits for these celebs and their stylists, with many of the white and cream stars looking washed out against the neutral carpet.
Keep scrolling to see some of the best social media reactions to the Oscars’ so-called “champagne” carpet.
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