The 2024 Academy Awards has named Christopher Nolan's "Oppenheimer" as its big winner - snatching seven awards, including Best Picture, Best Actor (Cillian Murphy), and Best Supporting Actor (Robert Downey Jr.).
With the 2024 Oscars now in the books, here are some of the highlights from this year's awards night.
Messi Shows Up
Messi, the seven-year-old border collie who starred in "Anatomy of a Fall" and whose handlers have been secretive about his Oscars appearance, made a surprise appearance on awards night to the adoration of his human fellow audiences.
According to Deadline, Messi wore a stylish bowtie and was escorted to sit on the front row of the Dolby Theater. The camera of the Oscar telecast then turned to Messi when he got a shoutout from Jimmy Kimmel in his opening monologue as this year's host.
"I haven't seen a French actor eat vomit like that since Gérard Depardieu," Kimmel said about the canine showstopper amid applause from the audience.
Kimmel Thanks Teamsters, IATSE Members Who Joined WGA's, SAG-AFTRA's Strike
Kimmel also gave gratitude to the Hollywood Teamsters and members of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) who joined last year's double strike of the Writers Guild of America (WGA) and the Screen Actors Guild (SAG-AFTRA).
"Know that in your upcoming negotiations we will stand with you," he told the strike participants.
"As pretentious and superficial as it can be, at its heart, [Hollywood is] a union town," he added. "It's not just a bunch of heavily botox-ed, Hailey Bieber smoothie drinking, diabetes prescription abusing, gluten sensitive nepo babies with perpetually shivery chihuahuas. This is a coalition of hard working, mentally tough American laborers, women and men who would 100% for sure die if we even had to touch the handle of the shovel."
Supporting Actors, Actresses in One Stage
The Oscars also performed a novel stunt when it came to awarding the best supporting actor and actress for this year's awards: They made former Oscar winners of the categories pay tribute to this year's winners.
For the best supporting actress role, Mary Steenburgen, Lupita Nyong'o, Jamie Lee Curtis, Rita Moreno, and Regina King came out on stage to commend this year's nominees and announce Da'Vine Joy Randolph as the winner.
Meanwhile, announcing the winner of the male category apparently became awkward as former best-supporting actors Ke Huy Quan, Sam Rockwell, Mahershala Ali, Tim Robbins, and Christoph Waltz gave a tribute to the former Marvel Cinematic Universe staple.
Sean Lennon Greets Mom Yoko Ono on Her Birthday
Sean Lennon accepted the Oscar for the production team of this year's best animated short film "War is Over!" based on the Christmas song of his parents, the late Beatles member John Lennon and Yoko Ono - who was celebrating her 91st birthday by the time the Oscars aired.
Since he could not be personally present to greet Ono, the younger Lennon gave a shoutout to his mother and told the crowd to wish her a happy birthday.
Oscars Crowd Can't See John Cena's Assets
One of the most memorable highlights of the 2024 Oscars was when former WWE wrestler and actor John Cena appeared on stage fully naked, with only an award envelope announcing this year's winner for best costume covering his genitals.
Cena did the stunt reluctantly, and to Kimmel's cajoling, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the notorious incident in the Oscars in which an actual streaker ran across the stage in the middle of the presentation of one of the awards in 1974.
He was eventually covered with what appeared to be cloth similar to curtains.
Ryan Gosling's 'Kenergy'
While "Barbie" star Ryan Gosling lost the best supporting actor competition to Downey, he won the hearts of the audience when he performed the song "I'm Just Ken," which was also nominated for best original song.
Wearing a hot pink suit, Gosling performed the piece alongside legendary musicians Mark Ronson and Slash. It was revealed that Ronson, who co-wrote the song, insisted Gosling perform it live at the Oscars with him.
The Oscar for Best Original Song eventually went to another "Barbie" hit, Billie Eilish's "What Was I Made For?"
End of 'Barbenheinmer' Saga?
After sweeping the Screen Actors Guild, the BAFTAs, and the Golden Globes, "Oppenheimer" was undisputedly declared the winner of the pop culture competition it had with "Barbie," winning seven Oscars to the latter's sole win for Eilish's song.
The award results starkly contrasted the box office results from both films last summer.
During the awards night, Gosling and "Oppenheimer" supporting actress nominee Emily Blunt were taking jabs at who was the real winner between the two films, but later admitted that there was no competition or rivalry and that everybody won due to the phenomenon being successful in the eyes of the public.
