Join us for full coverage of this year’s Academy Awards! We kick off on the red carpet at 2pm PT, 5pm ET and 10pm GMT, then move into the Dolby Theatre for the ceremony itself from 5pm PT, 8pm ET and 1am GMT
4.27am GMT
OK, so I may not think I’m so gay while watching the dresses on the red carpet, but I sure am when I find myself singing along to “Doe a deer, a female deer” from the Sound of Music. It’s like a verbal tic: I can’t stop belting along with Julie Andrews about that lonely goatherd and those Alps. And I feel damn old when I realize I first went to the Sound of Music Singalong when the 50 year old film was celebrating its 35th anniversary.
4.27am GMT
Backstage, Laura Poitras links Edward Snowden’s surveillance revelations to the FBI’s snooping on civil rights leaders, as depicted in Selma. “This is what happens when there is no oversight.”
4.27am GMT
Desplat’s music for The Grand Budapest Hotel moved from a canter to a gallop and back; it pulled off the interesting trick of pastiching something not quite identifiable - vague Central European folk and cafe quartet music. Again, probably the best choice.
4.26am GMT
Feel cold sweat creep from your entire body as you watch this Vine of John Travolta and Adele Dazeem:
4.26am GMT
The score for The Grand Budapest Hotel is such that it just made the Oscars audience - cool and beautiful millionaires, the lot of them - clap along like the Strictly Come Dancing audience. That means it definitely deserved the Oscar, right?
4.24am GMT
Not everyone is as keen on The Sound of Music as Gaga. Perhaps they would be if they knew what it was?
Wtf is "the sound of music" ? Never heard of it
What is the Sound of Music
4.23am GMT
The Imitation Game’s composer wins – having been nominated six times before without a gong. He was also nominated for The Grand Budapest Hotel.
4.22am GMT
From below the line, someone is after Stuart Heritage’s job:
'given that it literally just reduced the entire Oscar audience to complete tears.'
Let's face it the show is so bad, Agadoo by Black Lace would have done the same.
4.21am GMT
And here comes Julie Andrews, to walk on stage and stare Lady Gaga in the eyes and just mouth the word ‘Why?’ over and over again.
4.20am GMT
Our own Andrew Pulver’s review of Lady Gaga? “I thought the whole point of her was she was supposed to be covered in meat or something?!”
4.19am GMT
That was actually pretty great. Let’s get her back to do Mary Poppins next year.
4.17am GMT
This is making me feel incredibly uneasy. It’s Lady Gaga singing a very straight version of The Sound of Music, and I’m terrified that she’s either going to go full-on dubstep or strip down to a ham bikini. The tension is killing me.
4.16am GMT
Jared Leto’s umbrella may yet appear, but we already have this:
WE WIN!.... and he doesn't even bring me up. Or thank me. Thanks, JK Simmons. #Oscars2015 #JKSimmons #BestSupportingActor
4.15am GMT
I think we might be about to see Lady Gaga doing The Sound of Music. I think all our lives are about to peak as one, you know.
4.11am GMT
Adding to Julianne’s tears are Chris Pine and David Oyelowo, who blubbed at the moving performance of Glory:
This. Moment. #Oscars pic.twitter.com/M9hQ7UvqTZ
Oh just Chris Pine crying. (So were we but it didn't look as good) #Oscars pic.twitter.com/q8H78hWsP3
4.07am GMT
As good as Everything Is Awesome is, it feels right that Glory won tonight, given that it literally just reduced the entire Oscar audience to complete tears.
4.07am GMT
Common and John Legend just won for Glory, the song from the movie Selma. Despite the Academy’s many race problems tonight, this is a big political win. The Oscar for Best Original Song could have gone to Everything Is Awesome, The Lego Movie’s theme song which long ago lost any aspirations it had to be ironic or satirical long ago. Everything Is Awesome has become as toothless as Happy, the type of mindlessly positive song meant to lull sheep into maintaining the status quo.
4.06am GMT
Common and John Legend’s Selma track wins, with each coming up to receive the award – and with their nerdy real names announced for all to hear. Congrats to Lonnie Lynn and John Stephens! They soberly highlight the huge numbers of black men incarcerated in the US during their acceptance speech.
4.05am GMT
“Benedict Cumberbatch is... the name you get when you ask John Travolta to pronounce ‘Ben Affleck’”. Neil Patrick Harris, you’re back in the game.
4.02am GMT
The final song to be performed tonight is Glory, by Common and John Legend. So your choices are fizzy exuberant pop, the touching final song ever written by a songwriting legend, a powerful song about important issues, or either Maroon 5 or Rita Ora. There’s a two in five chance that this category will go horribly.
3.59am GMT
And one from Snowden himself:
When Laura Poitras asked me if she could film our encounters, I was extremely reluctant. I’m grateful that I allowed her to persuade me. The result is a brave and brilliant film that deserves the honor and recognition it has received. My hope is that this award will encourage more people to see the film and be inspired by its message that ordinary citizens, working together, can change the world.
3.59am GMT
Cheer up Julianne – you’re very likely to win!
I think Julianne Moore has been crying this whole show.
Has Julianne Moore been crying all night because she knows we're all disappointed she didn't wear Tom Ford or ????
Julianne Moore is crying during everyone else's speech. She's going to be a mess when she gets up to accept her award. Bring it. #Oscars2015
Every time the camera flashes to Julianne Moore I think she has just finished crying. #restingcryface #Oscars2015 pic.twitter.com/mE3Ne01SK4
3.59am GMT
“Don’t forget the briefcase in a box” says Neil Patrick Harris, referring to the gimmick first mentioned by the past-life version of him who existed before he’d visibly given up the will to live.
The American Sniper baby's locked in that NPH box, I just know it.
At the end of the Oscars, we find out Gwyneth Paltrow’s head is in the Neil Patrick Harris prediction box.
3.57am GMT
Congratulations to Laura Poitras. When she filmed Snowden, Glenn Greenwald and myself in Hong Kong, it never occurred to me she had something as ambitious as CitizenFour in mind.
3.56am GMT
Once again, Joan Rivers was the most egregious snub in the tributes to stars who died in the last year – read more in our news piece here.
Joan Rivers, an egregious snub in the In Memoriam? She was famous for lambasting actresses for their bad fashion choices, and otherwise calling them "sluts". Not a favorite person in Hollywood at all, at all, at all.
3.55am GMT
Anyone associated with this newspaper is bound to feel good or even slightly proprietorial about Citizenfour: it is a very important film and a really important piece of documentary journalism, touching upon democracy and privacy. The absence of Edward Snowden from the stage is telling.
3.54am GMT
Interesting response to CitizenFour’s win from the audience there. Julianne Moore was basically in tears. Reese Witherspoon, meanwhile, just about managed a ferociously dainty round of applause that barely managed to conceal her boredom. At this stage of the evening, I know how she feels.
3.54am GMT
Patricia Arquette, clutching her Oscar backstage, repeated her call for equality in Hollywood. “It is time for us. Equal means equal.”
3.51am GMT
Much happiness in Guardian towers at the win for Laura Poitras’s Edward Snowden doc – read more here.
3.51am GMT
Terrence Howard, hands down, has been my absolute favourite part of the evening. I hope he gets a job presenting Kids Do The Funniest Things out of this. “This next clip... oh man, I’m so blown away by this right now,” he’ll say, lips quivering and eyes brimming with tears, “is a clip of, oh man, it’s such a beautiful clip. It’s a kid getting hit in the nuts with a stick.”
3.48am GMT
Here’s Terrence Howard, ostensibly here to introduce clips from Selma and The Imitation Game but really to deliver the most ridiculous audition performance in Hollywood history, because he’s not really in very much stuff any more.
3.47am GMT
The editing Oscar for Whiplash is a very popular choice and Tom Cross certainly conjured those rhythmic surges of fear and euphoria and the confrontation between Simmons and Teller, especially in that huge final scene. My choice for editor would have been Sandra Adair for the way she assembled the footage in Boyhood.
3.44am GMT
Cumberbatch just said ‘arse’ onstage. This would be shocking if everyone watching hadn’t already been hypnotised into a state of dumb catatonia by this tedious, tedious ceremony.
3.44am GMT
Tom Cross wins for the Chazelle drama. That’s three for Whiplash.
3.42am GMT
The death-reel has become notorious for possible diplomatic incidents with snubs, oversights and omissions. But I always find it a genuinely melancholy moment in awards ceremony — a fusillade of gloomy mini-lifetime-achievement-award-type stabs of sadness.
3.39am GMT
The In Memoriams this year are a bit like the titles to a 1980s British dramedy series starring Richard Briers.
3.38am GMT
I think they’ve muted the applause. Which is probably a good thing. Also a good thing: Bette Midler isn’t singing Wind Beneath My Wings at them this year either.
I spoke too soon. Richard Attenborough got clapped. As did Robin Williams. And Mike Nichols. Up yours, all the other dead people. I spoke too soon about the other thing, too. Jennifer Hudson’s singing the nearest possible equivalent to Wind Beneath My Wings at them. No lessons have been learned.
3.36am GMT
An intriguing death montage update from Hadley Freeman.
We were told not to applaud during this. The audience rebelled for Mork
3.35am GMT
Director of Photography Emmanuel Lubezki is one of the visual artistic talents of our time. Gravity, Y Tu Mama Tambien, The Tree of Life...say what you will about these films, they are all extremely beautiful visually. And it’s extraordinary to think one person “shot” such film diverse films (Gravity also required an extraordinary Director of Photography to oversee what was, in essence, a great deal of animation). That he won for Birdman is worthy, and perhaps a bit surprising, given that most of the mise en scene awards have been going to the Grand Budapest Hotel.
3.33am GMT
Meryl Streep quotes Joan Didion’s The Year of Magical Thinking to pay tribute to those who died this year. Among those remembered: Mickey Rooney, James Garner, Edward Herrmann, Maya Angelou, Anita Ekberg, Richard Attenborough, Robin Williams, Rod Taylor, Luise Rainer, Lauren Bacall, Misty Upham, Eli Wallach, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Alain Resnais, Mike Nichols and more. And Bob Hoskins! Unlike Bafta.
But no Joan Rivers:
How the hell was Joan Rivers not in the In Memoriam?
Why in the hell was Joan Rivers not in that tribute?????
3.31am GMT
Meryl’s here! She’s presenting the annual Oscars death montage. I hope the audience doesn’t applaud all the dead people this year.
3.31am GMT
Even Wes Anderson’s clapping has perfect symmetry
pic.twitter.com/Bem68swNDo
3.30am GMT
Another remarkable win for Emmanuel Lubezki (for Birdman) and a very different achievement from his work last year on Gravity. That was all about work in the studio. This was an intensely choreographed camera-work, digitally sutured to create the illusion of unbroken takes, moving from interiors to exterior locations, with challengingly different conditions in terms of light.
3.27am GMT
Theory: did Emmanuel Lubezki deserve that Oscar, or was his win simply a calculated effort to stop anyone from accidentally saying ‘Dick Poop’ again? You decide.
3.25am GMT
I admit it. I was hoping for something for Mike Leigh’s Mr Turner. But production design for The Grand Budapest Hotel is justified. It’s an incredible created world, entire of itself, with a marvellous sense of something 3D springing off the pages of a storybook
3.25am GMT
Emmanuel Lubezki wins two years in a row, having won for Gravity last year. That’s Birdman’s first by the way.
3.25am GMT
Brilliant playing off from the orchestra there, chopping off Anna Pinnock before she’d even taken breath. In a way, this is all her fault. Had she yelled ‘SOMEONE I KNOW DIED ONCE’ on the way to the microphone, they wouldn’t have even made a peep.
3.23am GMT
Backstage, Dana Perry, the producer of best documentary short Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1 laughed off Neil Patrick Harris’s joke about needing “a lot of balls” to wear her pom-pom dress.
3.22am GMT
That’s three now for the Wes Anderson flick. Adam Stockhausen and Anna Pinnock win.
3.20am GMT
The highlight of every Oscars ceremony now - the speech from Academy president Cheryl Boone Isaacs. She gets full marks for exaggerating the pioneering spirit of movies, and for exaggerating the responsibilities of the movie business. But she loses all those points for not dropping to her knees and begging the audience not to torrent films any more like the Academy president usually does. Six out of ten.
3.19am GMT
Of all the various zings from the Guardian commenters below the line, this is perhaps the most brutally accurate:
What the hell is Adam Levine doing.
I've heard better singing from a mongoose with throat cancer. Things are going form bad to worse.
3.14am GMT
The Big Hero 6 team were played off! And they capitulated! This is an important stage in the epic fightback between actors and musicians. They’ll get cocky now, the orchestra. Julianne Moore will be lucky if she so much as gets three syllables out before they start parping at her.
3.14am GMT
Given that The Lego Movie was unaccountably nixed, Big Hero 6 was probably the best choice. But it’s a teensy bit overrated. There are some lovely, imaginative Japanamerican “fusion” designs and the opening scenes sketching out the boy-robot relationship are great. It becomes a little bit derivative as it sets up the franchise, but a distinctive animation and a worthy winner from this list.
3.12am GMT
For no reason, here’s a clip of The Lego Movie
3.11am GMT
Bit of a shock perhaps, beating How To Train Your Dragon 2, which won at the Globes. Read more here.
3.10am GMT
Patrick Osborne and Kristina Reed talk and talk and talk, but they’re not played off. The orchestra are all too drunk to care now. The timpani player has already pawned off his drum. It’s all very sad. Maybe, if they all close their eyes and believe as hard as they can, they’ll get to play someone off later this evening. Maybe.
3.08am GMT
Patrick Osborne and Kristina Reed win.
3.07am GMT
Kevin Hart looks dinky even next to Anna Kendrick, the dinkiest of all the female actors here tonight.
3.07am GMT
I’m not sure about this win. Interstellar isn’t Christopher Nolan’s most visually impressive or inventive film and (heretically) I think this Oscar might more justifiably have gone to X-Men Days Of Future Past. But it’s good to see something go to Interstellar, from which so much was expected.
3.06am GMT
Weirdest shade of the night goes to Chloe Moretz, who just used her presentation speech to deliver a bizarre eff-you to William Goldman. I hope this grudge is settled in the most dignified way possible - with a live cagefight this time next year.
3.04am GMT
Overlooked in the major categories, Christopher Nolan’s sci-fi epic wins. Andrew Lockley, Ian Hunter, Scott R Fisher and Paul J Franklin pile on stage, with the latter Brit thanking all the people to thank.
3.04am GMT
Patricia Arquette just won for best supporting actress for Boyhood. I had my problems with that film, especially the way Arquette’s character had the only scene with a person of color (in which she was the benevolent white woman savior to a cartoonishly grateful Hispanic man). Her character reinforced a kind of white supremacy.
3.02am GMT
Hooray! Rita Ora’s here, hot on the heels of her substantial one-nanosecond-long 50 Shades of Grey role, to sing Grateful from Beyond the Lights. It’s a shame that the Oscars weren’t quicker to utilise the other coaching staff from The Voice UK, because I’d be quite interested to see how that Glen Campbell song would have sounded as a duet between Will.i.am and that bloke from Kaiser Chiefs.
2.59am GMT
Patricia Arquette has made the first overtly political statement of the night, calling for equal pay for women. Meryl Streep in particular reacted well to this, standing up and waving her arms around. There’s a chance that she just did this because she hasn’t won anything yet and she wants to make sure that everyone remembers that she still exists, but let’s assume this isn’t the case.
2.58am GMT
Backstage, Pawel Pawlikowski said American filmgoers had been given the wrong idea about Ida.
2.58am GMT
This is an award that I feel genuinely feel very happy about: it’s a pleasing paradox that in a movie which is about maleness in many ways Arquette’s incarnation of motherhood should have turned out to have been so powerful — especially at the end of the film. She crowns a brilliant series of scenes with that glorious final empty-nest scene. And what a great speech.
2.55am GMT
It’s a shame there isn’t an Oscar category for sustained performance by an actress who steadfastly refuses to move her jaw when she talks, because I’ve seen The Imitation Game and Keira Knightley would have walked that.
2.54am GMT
Everyone called it, as with her supporting actor counterpart: Patricia Arquette wins for Boyhood. Read more here.
In an impassioned climax to her speech, she said: “To every woman who gave birth to every taxpayer and citizen of this nation: we have fought for everybody else’s equal rights. It’s our time to have wage equality once and for all and it’s our time to fight for equal rights for women in America.”
Life goals: Say something that makes Meryl Streep and J.Lo react like this #oscars pic.twitter.com/YnPbSMfI4U
2.51am GMT
Perhaps it is obvious — but what a well-judged Oscar for sound mixing for Whiplash: the control of the music is tremendous, as is the feel and texture of those drum solos.
2.50am GMT
The orchestra didn’t even attempt to play off Craig Mann, Ben Wilkins and Thomas Curley just then. They’ve all tramped off home, tubas under their arms, cursing everyone’s dead relatives for stopping them doing their job properly.
2.49am GMT
Marvel’s influence is felt EVERYWHERE
That Oscars stage looks like the Bifrost. pic.twitter.com/4qvuE2A4BO
2.49am GMT
First win for the Clint Eastwood drama that’s the night’s big commercial success. Alan Robert Murray and Bub Asman bag it.
2.47am GMT
Margot Robbie and Miles Teller are presenting a quick retrospective of the Scientific and Technical awards. “These professionals are bravely pushing the boundaries of what cinema is capable of,” says Teller. “All these long words are hurting my pretty little lady-brain!” cries Robbie in confused retaliation. I’m paraphrasing here, but only just. It’s not a great moment, in all honesty.
2.47am GMT
Craig Mann, Ben Wilkins and Thomas Curley step up. That’s two now for Damien Chazelle’s drama.
2.44am GMT
NPH ripped off our Oscar hustings idea and we want at least a mention on a broadcast going out to tens of millions of people to make up for it
2.44am GMT
Aha, here comes a Good Bit: Neil Patrick Harris has found himself locked out of his dressing room and has to parade through the auditorium in his underwear, Birdman-style. I can’t wait to see what his hilarious American Sniper spoof will be!
2.39am GMT
I just missed Tim McGraw singing a very sad Glen Campbell song that I’m glad I didn’t pay much attention to, because I’ve been drinking a lot of Pepsi and I’m worried that at this point my tears would be pure syrup.
2.37am GMT
Neil Patrick Harris is back, making another one of his collar-tugging references to the Selma business. So far, his performance has been 80% that and 20% making terrible jokes that are far far beneath him. If I go quiet for a few minutes, it’s because I’m watching that Tonys video from earlier and thinking about what could have been.
2.35am GMT
David Oyelowo brings the lols with Neil Patrick Harris, who forces him to slag off Annie. Very light chuckles ensue!
Hey, David Oyelowo, how do you think NPH is doing as an #Oscars host? pic.twitter.com/AHsEe37anW
2.33am GMT
Maureen O’Hara at 94. Still kicking ass and taking names.
2.33am GMT
Tonight’s orchestra is, let’s face it, a bit mimsying. Winners talk, the orchestra plays, the winners mention a dead person and the orchestra grinds to a halt. At this stage a decision needs to be made - either don’t start playing so early, or go down in history as The Oscars Orchestra That Really Hates All Dead Folk. I’d err for the latter, just to see what happens.
2.31am GMT
The fightback against the orchestra interrupting winners citing dead relatives picks up pace
I want EVERYONE to defeat the playoff music tonight. #Oscars
I love that the winners are 2 and O so far against the play off music #Oscar2015
Love that no one is respecting the music play-off this year. #oscars
2.31am GMT
Andrew Pulver spoke to Mat Kirkby and James Lucas way before they won their live action short Oscar. Like four days before! Find out who they are
2.29am GMT
Ellen Goosenberg Kent and Dana Perry are the winners.
2.28am GMT
Mat Kirkby and James Lucas also blew through their play-off music. This is cute now, but let’s see how things stand when it’s 5am and the whole thing’s overrun and I’ve missed my train home.
2.26am GMT
Sally Hawkins-starring short wins. Mat Kirkby and James Lucas collect the non-Lego gongs. Read more about their journey from burger ad directors to Oscar glory.
2.26am GMT
Academy gets rapped knuckles:
oscars so white the hardest rapper on stage is andy samberg
2.26am GMT
Kerry Washington and Jason Bateman walk onstage to The Look of Love. And, like most loving couples I’ve ever met, they don’t make eye contact and refuse to react to anything that the other one says. Who said romance was dead?
2.25am GMT
@thrasherxy @readDanwrite Thanks, Debbie Downer!
2.22am GMT
Backstage in the press room JK Simmons noted that perhaps he will no longer be principally known for fronting Farmers Insurance ads. “Maybe more people saw me tonight than in the commercials.. this is the cherry on top.”
He had struggled in regional theatre and “lean times” for a long time, he confided, and came close to quitting Hollywood. “I almost got back on the bus a handful of times.
2.20am GMT
It’s time for a performance of Everything Is Awesome from The Lego Movie. There are cowboys. There are builders. There’s an interlude by Emo Batman. Oprah Winfrey just got handed a Lego statue. This is easily the best thing to happen so far tonight. If Maroon 5 wins best song over this, I’m going to dirty protest right here in my seat.
2.19am GMT
The Lego Movie gets a minute in the sun, with Tegan and Sara performing Everything is Awesome with The Lonely Island. Lots of Lego statues proffered perhaps in homage to Philip Lord’s perfect response to not getting nominated:
It's okay. Made my own! pic.twitter.com/kgyu1GRHGR
EVERYTHING IS AWESOME. pic.twitter.com/rK9HNJHqY3
2.19am GMT
Rolling Stone have a nice Ida fact for us:
#Ida is the first black-and-white film to win Best Foreign-Language #Oscars since 'Closely Watched Trains' in 1967.
2.19am GMT
Who shall we pick to introduce a film about a young boy growing into a man? SHIRLEY MACLAINE
2.17am GMT
Because Birdman’s score is just a lot of drumming, the Oscars decided to use Crazy by Gnarls Barkley to soundtrack its best picture clips. I can’t work out how insensitive that is, but this is the internet so I’ll just say it’s really insensitive.
2.15am GMT
Whoa! I was not expecting that. I really thought best foreign language film would go to Leviathan — but most people were tipping Ida. And they were right. It is a glorious film, luminous, and cold. Incredible to think how Pawlikowski has mutated away from documentary and then mutated away from English-language cinema to his native Polish. A powerful, historically literate movie.
2.14am GMT
Pawel Pawlikowski completely blew through his play-off music, there, and it was beautiful. He’s a role model for all future winners. Note to all other future winners: if you want your play-off music to come to a sudden guilty halt, mention your late wife in your acceptance speech. Pawel Pawlikowski is my new hero.
The orchestra is like the UN: can make a lot of noise, but no enforcement power whatsoever.
2.14am GMT
Backstage at the #Oscars in the #ArchDigestGreenRoom with @Lupita_Nyongo pic.twitter.com/Tffdle71Wt
2.11am GMT
Pawel Pawlikowski triumphs! Read more here. He nearly gets hooked off for going on waaaay too long with his speech. Bravo!
“We make a film about silence and withdrawing from the world and the need for contemplation – and here we are, at the epicentre of world noise and attention. Fantastic – life is full of surprises,” is about 4% of what he said.
2.10am GMT
I just checked Twitter. Adam Levine is the number one worldwide trend. Adam Levine from Maroon 5. Even though literally every other famous person in the world is in the same room as him. The internet makes me sad.
2.09am GMT
Chiwetel Ejiofor gets mangled!
2.09am GMT
As someone who didn’t really like the Grand Budapest Hotel, and as a gay who doesn’t care much about clothes (I do care a bit more about makeup) I’ll still say the Grand Budapest Hotel deserved to win its costume and makeup Oscars. It’s a plotless film which should really be thought of as a painting that happens to move. The story and acting are pretty irrelevant, and the art direction is the film. So if clothes and makeup are your thing, and your idea of a good time is trying to get into Fashion Week show, check into the Grand Budapest Hotel sometime. If they’re not, skip the visit.
2.07am GMT
Two segments in, and let’s have a quick assessment of Neil Patrick Harris’s performance so far.
2.07am GMT
With edgy American Sniper jokes, an instant addressing of the race arguments, and Jack Black capering like a bear, it’s the opening dance number:
2.07am GMT
NPH backlash has begun. Chief whipper: Piers Morgan
Neil Patrick Harris is such an entertaining host in theory
.@LAPDHQ can you arrest Neil Patrick Harris for mugging
Neil Patrick Harris not really firing for me yet. Looks nervous. #Oscars
Cool joke, NPH #oscars pic.twitter.com/B9Nt29Qoua
2.05am GMT
Another very well-judged prize: the hair and styling in The Grand Budapest Hotel are part of the beautifully conceived extraneous touches in this film which are such a vital part of its texture.
2.03am GMT
I’d be extremely happy if The Grand Budapest Hotel won all the Oscars this year. Having said that, I’ve just remembered that it can’t because Whiplash has already won one. Is it too late to steal it back from JK Simmons? We could distract him by mucking around with his hat or something. Look, I haven’t thought this through.
2.01am GMT
Win two! Frances Hannon and Mark Coulier step up.
2.01am GMT
An Oscar for the costumes in The Grand Budapest Hotel is simple justice. They were as elegant, eccentric and crafted as everything else in that extraordinary production design. In no other film were the costumes were such a fit with the general art direction and vision. Wonderful stuff.
2.01am GMT
Enjoying NPH’s zingers? We’re rounding about the best quotes of the night as they come in.
1.59am GMT
Next up, Jennifer Lopez and Chris Pine. Pine frankly could have had a shave for tonight, but at least he got through his speech without making a horrific reference to J-Lo’s boobs. This is progress.
1.58am GMT
The bellboy caps have it. Milena Canonero steps up to the stage.
1.57am GMT
NPH is trying to win over the black crowd, but is it backfiring? First, he calls out Oprah for being as big as American Sniper’s profits. Next, he asks Octavia Spencer to leave the theater and watch his prediction box, admonishing her not to eat any snacks! You get the feeling watching both sisters’ faces they didn’t see those barbs coming.
1.57am GMT
Thanks to the fashion team for their skewering of Kerry Washington’s bridesmaid dress, amongst other things. We’re now deep into the ceremony, having endured Maroon 5. Next up: costume design.
1.57am GMT
American Sniper gags not going down well.
I'm not sure that American Sniper jokes are a good idea.
Without song though, NPH is kind of weak. I'll give him the opening number though. Also too many American Sniper jokes already #Oscars2015
Don’t make jokes about American Sniper, Neil. #Oscars2015
1.54am GMT
Take a minute to celebrate JK’s win by finding out if he’d scream at you for DRAGGING! Or RUSHING! by playing our Whiplash game
1.52am GMT
Oh dear God. Maroon 5 are performing a song now. Nobody warned me that this would happen. I could be in bed now. I have a nice bed. It’s a comfortable bed. But, oh no, instead I’m watching a bloke dressed as a waiter busk at millionaires. My life is the worst.
1.52am GMT
That’s it from the frock front line. But as we the fashion desk flounce off, catch up with every dress so far in our hits and misses gallery.
1.51am GMT
And their mums to be fair.
1.50am GMT
Liam Neeson is onstage. For a moment it seems as if the Academy has created a new category just for films that have posters where Liam Neeson holds a gun of some description (because there must have been about 20 of them this year alone). But, alas, he’s just introducing a couple of best picture contenders.
1.49am GMT
Watching the rushing vs dragging clip yet again before Simmons came up reminded me of that extraordinary “close-up” acting he was doing. Shoving his face right into Miles Teller’s — and right into the camera. That brutal craggy face, weirdly reminding me of Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter.
1.48am GMT
Oh, this is a nice little gimmick. Neil Patrick Harris has made his own Oscar predictions, and he’s put them in a briefcase, and he’s put the briefcase in a box. And then something else that I might have missed. But, hey, a briefcase in a box. It’s already better than anything MacFarlane did.
1.47am GMT
You can read the full list of winners as they come in, by the way.
1.46am GMT
There may be more.
1.45am GMT
In his speech, Simmons thanks his children. Which I’ve never been a huge fan of, because it essentially means that he’s congratulating his own genitals.
1.44am GMT
First award to be handed out is the JK Simmons Foregone Conclusion Award. It is won by JK Simmons, who has very publicly snubbed the hat he was wearing earlier. Note to self: write an extended thinkpiece about the Academy’s lifelong bias against natty headgear.
1.43am GMT
The Whiplash actor completes his awards season streak, for his performance as monstrous music teacher. Read more here.
“I am grateful every day for the most remarkable person I know – my wife, Michelle Schumacher. I’m grateful for your love, your kindness, your wisdom, your sacrifice and your patience,” he says. “And if I may, call your mom, call your dad. If you’re lucky to have a person alive on this planet, call them. Listen to them, talk to them, for as long as they want to talk to you. Thank you, Mom and Dad.”
1.42am GMT
Tonight, according to NPH, is dedicated to the people who paid to see the films that reminded them to be brave in the face of danger. I paid to see the last Hobbit film. It mainly reminded me that a cinema is no place to take a nap.
1.41am GMT
Well, that opening number was slick, buttery, very showtuney and Broadway-ish. For me it was also weirdly humourless and self-important, and the Jack Black intervention highly self-conscious. It’s one of those Oscar night events that must play well superbly well in the room, but on the small screen already looks cheesy, especially Neil assuming the form of the statuette itself.
1.40am GMT
Here’s the amazing thing about Neil Patrick Harris. He is the American superstar – for gays, for straights … and with honoring Hollywood’s “best and whitest”, he’s making a play for the handful of non-white people in the hall.
1.38am GMT
Oh, wait, now Jack Black’s jumped onstage. He’s playing the Mr Potter to NPH’s James Stewart, grouching about the dire state of the movie industry. This looks to be the tone of the entire show - it’s going to be slyly self-referential, and quick to criticise itself before anyone else can. Which means it’s going to be a really difficult ceremony to liveblog, so good luck reading along.
1.36am GMT
1.36am GMT
Courtesy of Jack Black!
1.35am GMT
Here’s Neil Patrick Harris, popping out of the ground like a geriatric Spice Girl. He’s surrounded by what appears to be several hundred Oscars that have been lynched.
Inevitably, he’s immediately singing a huge song and dance number. Imagine Frozen, if Frozen was about the better-than-anticipated box office gross of Good Will Hunting.
1.34am GMT
More from David Cox:
AMPAS members are 94% white, 77% male and 86% over 50, according to the LA Times. Here at the AMPAS UK party in London’s Soho House, on the other hand, we’re delightfully diverse, barely legal age-wise, totally gender-balanced and unbelievably hot (in both senses).
1.32am GMT
NPH gets in there early; second line of the monologue.
An @ActuallyNPH musical moment at the Oscars. I feel like my whole life has been building towards this.
1.31am GMT
1.31am GMT
View from the nosebleed seats: Lady Gaga, yukking it up down down in front pic.twitter.com/CFxNVmjnjC
1.30am GMT
There is something very strange about watching Taya Kyle, widow of Chris Kyle, (the basis of American Sniper) wearing a green designer gown and walking down the red carpet towards the Oscars. “What your husband did,” ABC’s Robin Roberts says to her, “they don’t do it for this” glory – nor for the $330 million the film has made at the box office. Roberts is here as a fluff entertainment reporter, but she’s still a reporter – and so it’s weird hearing her so effusively thank the widow of a sniper who killed so many people in a war based on a lie.
It’s also queer watching the widow Kyle having a “Cinderella” moment, as she described it, the same week the trial takes place about how her sniper husband was himself allegedly murdered by an Iraq War vet. (Speaking of which, I keep seeing ads for a new Disney live-action Cinderella movie. Hasn’t Hollywood told the Cinderella story enough yet?)
1.29am GMT
1.27am GMT
ABC’s host, oblivious to the actor’s 19 NOMINATIONS, said of Meryl Streep: “You never know who you’re going to see inside here!” Cue mirth:
Four guys agree! pic.twitter.com/RbWraVqHVb
1.27am GMT
When there's :30 seconds left on the Oven but you have to go to the #Oscars pic.twitter.com/Vl1eucrXI7
Lady Gaga’s baking gloves are the new Jared Leto’s big umbrella which was the new JK Simmons’ hat.
1.27am GMT
More awards. This time, it’s for most unlikely couple clutching on the red carpet.
At number three:
File this photo under: Reasons why Jennifer Aniston and Emma Stone are forever our faves. #Access pic.twitter.com/F1tQC9oTwO
Lady Gaga with Keira Knightley at the #Oscars2015 red carpet! pic.twitter.com/QOxYf7ENVL
True Detective, Season 3. Or #Oscars. pic.twitter.com/jszGLMvA7E
1.26am GMT
1.25am GMT
1.25am GMT
1.21am GMT
1.21am GMT
And we have our first winner. The award for best red carpet sashay goes, inevitably, to Oprah.
1.21am GMT
Peter Bradshaw has joined the party. And he thinks it’s - finally - time The Hangover 3 got some recognition from the Academy (sort of) ...
So here we are. This is my first experience liveblogging the Oscars. I’m assured that watching it on TV, reading tweets, and liveblogs and watching Vines not only intensifies your enjoyment of the event — but does wonders for your concentration and long-term memory. Anyway, however fatuous this sounds (ahem!) I am excited about this Oscars, because I think there are some genuinely outstanding movies — Boyhood, Birdman, The Grand Budapest Hotel, The Theory Of Everything — which are in line to get awards. But also there is the very real possibility that Bradley Cooper and American Sniper will get something too. Which is a bit like The Hangover 3 winning a lot of Academy Awards. Anyway, here goes.
1.21am GMT
Readers around the world: is Neil Patrick Harris doing little region-specific stings in your country too? In the UK, we’re getting “This is Neil Patrick Harris and you’re watching exclusively on Sky” followed by a wry little half-smile. The Oscars broadcasts in 200 countries. Did he do the same half-smile for all of them? I’m asking because I’m worried about how sore his poor little face must have got.
1.17am GMT
1.17am GMT
1.17am GMT
Jared Leto’s giant umbrella could be the new JK Simmons’ hat.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ pic.twitter.com/cI19vn4rth
1.15am GMT
Let us use a compare-and-contrast to gauge the wonder of John Travolta’s pelt.
John Travolta tells us the rain is chaotic on the Oscars red carpet. pic.twitter.com/esnpxMWUPE via @Hollyscoop Umm. John's Hair.
1.14am GMT
Sixteen minutes to go before the ceremony begins. And then about 12 hours before it ends. And then about three more hours before we can all start speculating about who’ll win next year. FUN.
1.13am GMT
1.11am GMT
1.10am GMT
The LEGO group have tweeted a picture of their take on tonight’s all-powerful idol. This kit is available NOW for only $19.99. #everythingisprofitable
#EverythingIsAwesome! @teganandsara and @thelonelyisland to perform at the #Oscars tonight! @TheLEGOMovie @TheAcademy pic.twitter.com/pg3LEcuSU3
1.09am GMT
More gold from Seacrest: the fact he talked to Naomi Watts about the frittata that she made this morning.
"Talking about Naomi Watts's frittata" is my new favorite euphemism.
1.06am GMT
1.04am GMT
Refresh your glasses, nip to the loo and print out your bingo card. This is not a drill.
1.03am GMT
The frock fightback continues. Leading the troops: Reese Witherspoon
"We're more than just our dresses." @RWitherspoon nailed it at the #Oscars.
#AskHerMore http://t.co/pz3DRaMAqG
1.03am GMT
Hadley’s in!
The decor in the Dolby Theater kinda reminds me of my grandmother's bathroom in Miami Beach pic.twitter.com/6wyOQjXhZT
1.02am GMT
1.01am GMT
John Legend and wife Chrissy Teigen had the big social lols of the Golden Globes, with Chrissy’s bummed-out “cryface” when John Legend won for his song Glory:
Me reading ur tweets pic.twitter.com/2wwDZnoPjt<