The 97th Academy Awards are currently underway, hosted by Conan O'Brien, and the two music categories have their winners. Clément Ducol, Camille, and Jacques Audiard won Best Original Song for "El Mal," the Golden Globe-winning tune Best Actress winner Zoe Saldaña performed in Emilia Pérez. Daniel Blumberg, former frontman of Yuck and 2007 Stereogum Band To Watch Cajun Dance Party, won Best Original Score for The Brutalist.
Mick Jagger made a surprise appearance to present the Best Original Song award. “Much as I love doing it, I wasn’t the first choice,” the Rolling Stone joked. "The producers really wanted Bob Dylan to do this. But Bob Dylan won’t do it because he said the best songs in a movie this year were in A Complete Unknown.” (Dylan really was invited to present, according to The Hollywood Reports.) With the "El Mal" win, Audiard became the second person to win an Oscar for writing or co-writing a song from a film they also directed (following "You Light Up My Life" writer Joe Brooks who won in 1978). This year's other nominees included another song Clément Ducol and Camille wrote for Emilia Pérez: “Mi Camino,” which Selena Gomez sang. Elton John, Bernie Taupin, Brandi Carlile, and Andrew Wyatt were nominated for “Never Too Late,” from the Disney+ documentary Elton John: Never Too Late. John was already a two-time winner for “Can You Feel The Love Tonight” in 1995 and “(I’m Gonna) Love Me Again” in 2020. Miike Snow leader Wyatt got a nomination for Barbie's “I’m Just Ken” last year. Black Pumas' Adrian Quesada and singer-songwriter Abraham Alexander got a nod for “Like A Bird” from Sing Sing, while perpetual nominee Diane Warren scored her 16th nomination for “The Journey,” which H.E.R. recorded for the Tyler Perry war film The Six Triple Eight. Warren now ties sound engineer Greg P. Russell for most nominations without ever winning an Oscar.
Mark Hamill presented the award for Best Original Score. Aside from Blumberg, Volker Bertelmann was nominated for Conclave, Clément Ducol and Camille for Emilia Pérez, John Powell and Stephen Schwartz for Wicked, and Kris Bowers for The Wild Robot. Notably, two-time winners Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross were snubbed for their score for Luca Guadagnino's Challengers, which is a bummer, because the Challengers score slaps.
after 16 nominations for Best Original Song in her career diane warren lost again. #oscars pic.twitter.com/tlFQa2LSGL
— 2000s (@PopCulture2000s) March 3, 2025
Conan O'Brien at the #Oscars: "Well, we're halfway through the show, which means it's time for Kendrick Lamar to come out and call Drake a pedophile." pic.twitter.com/KmbX3QjnlM
— Variety (@Variety) March 3, 2025
