Conan O’Brien Details Oscars Opening That Got Cut, Says the Academy Refused to Let Him Put Clothes on an Oscar or Lay It Down Horizontally: ‘That Blew My Mind’

variety.com:

Zack Sharf Digital News Director Conan O’Brien and his Oscars head writer Mike Sweeney revealed on the former’s podcast that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences refused to let them put clothes on an Oscar or have it presented horizontally.

O’Brien hosted the 2025 Academy Awards earlier this month and had some ideas for a promo video that got turned down. The promo featured O’Brien and a 9-foot-tall Oscar statuette as a domestic couple. “We’re fighting about things couples fight about,” O’Brien said on the “Conan Needs a Friend” podcast about the promo. “At one point, I thought wouldn’t it be great if it’s just on the couch?

Let’s lay it on a really big couch and I’ll be vacuuming and say, ‘Could you at least lift your feet? Or could you at least get up and help?

Load the dishwasher?’ We wanted to do it and they just said, ‘No, no no, that can’t happen.’” O’Brien remembered, “One of the people from the Academy came forward and said, ‘Oscar can never be horizontal.’ And that blew my mind.