The Oscars executive producer Will Packer has announced members of the behind the scenes team for the March 27th broadcast.

The team starts with head writer Jon Macks. Macks returns for his 25th Oscars telecast. An eight-time Primetime Emmy nominee and two-time Writers Guild of America Award winner, Macks has been head show writer for numerous Oscars telecasts and served as head writer or co-head writer for hosts Chris Rock, Billy Crystal, Steve Martin and Hugh Jackman. In addition, he has been on the debate prep team for five Democratic presidential nominees, was a lead writer on the 2020 Democratic National Convention and the “Celebrating America” inauguration special.

Dave Boone is a three-time Emmy- and three-time Writers Guild of America Award-winning writer and producer. Returning for his 12th Oscars telecast, he served as head writer for Neil Patrick Harris on the 87th Oscars. The head writer of 17 consecutive Tony Awards telecasts, his other credits include multiple “The Kennedy Center Honors,” “Primetime Emmy Awards,” “Daytime Emmys,” “Academy of Country Music Awards” and “New Year’s Rockin’ Eve.” He is responsible for more than 100 hours of live television each year. Boone is also a sought-after script doctor for Broadway.

Dana Eagle joins the Oscars production team as a first-time writer. Eagle was previously a creative consultant on Wanda Sykes’s Emmy-nominated Netflix comedy special “Wanda Sykes: Not Normal.” Her book “How to Be Depressed: A Guide” has been published in four languages. As a comedian, she has been seen on NBC’s “Last Comic Standing,” “The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson” and Comedy Central. Her one-woman show “Stones from Glass Houses” premiered at HBO’s U.S. Comedy Arts Festival.

Mitch Marchand returns to the writing staff for his third Oscars telecast. His credits as a comedy writer include such awards shows as “BET Awards,” “Hip Hop Awards,” “UNCF Evening of Stars,” “MTV Video Music Awards,” “NAACP Image Awards” and “Primetime Emmy Awards.” He has penned jokes for such A-list talent as Jamie Foxx, Anthony Anderson, Tiffany Haddish, Kevin Hart and Chris Rock; and created presentations for Oprah Winfrey, Tyler Perry, Quincy Jones and Kerry Washington. Marchand is currently a co-producer on the Netflix series “The Upshaws,” starring Mike Epps and Wanda Sykes, which is currently in production on its second season.

Suli McCullough joins the Oscars production team as a writer. A stand-up comedian, comic actor and writer-producer, he was a writer on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” and served as a consultant writer for the “14th Annual ESPY Awards.” His writing credits include “The 73rd Primetime Emmy Awards,” a sketch for Jamie Foxx for “Saturday Night Live,” “Lopez Tonight,” “MTV Music Awards,” “BET Awards,” “American Music Awards” and “Nickelodeon’s Kids’ Choice Awards.” His producing credits include “The Amber Rose Show” on VH1, “Def Comedy Jam” and “Last Comic Standing,” and the feature documentary “Dying Laughing.” McCullough is also known for his roles in “Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood” and “The Jamie Foxx Show.”

Agathe Panaretos returns to the Oscars show for the second time as a writer. She has written for a variety of shows including “2021 MTV Video Music Awards,” “Graduate Together: American Honors the High School Class of 2020” and “The 71st Primetime Emmy Awards.” She previously wrote for Netflix’s first talk show, “Chelsea,” as well as “Crank Yankers” and “What Just Happened??! With Fred Savage.” In addition, she was a writer-at-large for The Onion and her work has been featured on E!, Team Coco and Funny or Die.

Danielle Schneider joins the Oscars production team as a writer. She is currently a co-executive producer for the upcoming HBO Max series “Clone High.” Most recently, Schneider was a co-executive producer for “Kenan,” alongside her writing partner Dannah Phirman, and “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.” Along with Phirman, she created, executive produced, wrote and starred in Hulu’s “The Hotwives of Orlando” and “The Hotwives of Las Vegas.” Schneider’s other writing credits include “Beverly Hills Chihuahua 2,” “I’m Sorry,” “Telenovela” and “Marry Me.”

Chuck Sklar returns as a writer for his fourth Oscars telecast. Originally a stand-up comic, he has written for Bill Maher’s “Politically Incorrect,” “Late Night with Conan O’Brien,” “The Chris Rock Show” and “Everybody Hates Chris,” among others. In addition, Sklar co-created the FX series “Totally Biased with W. Kamau Bell” and served as the executive producer on the film “Tom of Your Life.

Rob Paine has been associated with the Oscars telecast for more than 20 years and returns as supervising producer. Paine has more than 200 credits to his name and has earned 11 Primetime Emmy^® Award nominations and a Peabody Award. He has specialized in live, large-scale television events and his credits include Super Bowl Halftime Shows, “Celebrating America: An Inauguration Night Special,” “The Kennedy Center Honors,” political conventions, concerts and comedy specials.

Production designer and creative director David Korins returns to the Oscars, having been the designer in 2019. Korins’s prolific work for Broadway includes the Tony^® Award-winning musicals “Hamilton” and “Dear Evan Hansen,” as well as “Beetlejuice.” Korins was the creative director and designer of “Immersive Van Gogh” and “Hamilton: The Exhibition”; and has collaborated with Sotheby’s, USC Shoah Foundation, Bruno Mars, Lady Gaga, Kanye West, Mariah Carey, Andrea Bocelli, TED and Gagosian. His television credits include “The 2020 Heisman Trophy Ceremony,” “Elton John: I’m Still Standing – A Grammy^® Salute,” one episode of “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver,” and “Grease: Live!,” for which he won an Emmy Award.

Lighting designer Robert Dickinson returns for his 33rd Oscars show. During his three-decades long career, he has won 18 Primetime Emmy Awards, including three for Oscars telecasts, and has over 1,500 on-screen television credits. His credits include “The Kennedy Center Honors,” “GRAMMY Awards,” “Primetime Emmy Awards,” “Tony Awards,” “Golden Globe^® Awards,” “American Music Awards” and “Academy of Country Music Awards”; Olympics ceremonies in Atlanta, Salt Lake City, Athens and Vancouver; Super Bowl Halftime Shows; and the specials “Peter Pan Live!” and “The Sound of Music Live!” Dickinson has also worked on numerous television music specials for the Eagles, the Rolling Stones, Fleetwood Mac and more.

Adam Blackstone joins the Oscars production team as the show’s music director. An Emmy-nominated music director and GRAMMY Award-nominated writer, Blackstone has held music directing positions with such artists as Justin Timberlake, Rihanna, Janet Jackson, Alicia Keys, Maroon 5 and Eminem, and collaborated with Shakira and Jennifer Lopez on the Super Bowl LIV Halftime Show, for which he was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award. He also was the musical director for the Super Bowl LII Halftime Show (2018) and this year’s Super Bowl LVI Halftime Show. His other credits include “A Grammy Salute to The Sounds of Change,” numerous “BET Awards,” “Soul Train Awards,” VH1 and MTV specials, and the Fox shows “The Four: Battle for Stardom” and “The Masked Singer.” He also appeared on season one of NBC’s “The Voice” as an advisor for coach Adam Levine. In 2009, Blackstone partnered with his wife, Kaisha, to start the company BASSic Black Entertainment, LLC (BBE).

Taryn Hurd rejoins the Oscars for the ninth consecutive year as talent producer. She also has served as talent producer on the past six Governors Awards ceremonies along with numerous television variety specials and award shows.

Sunday afternoon’s Spirit Awards, on the IFC Channel, were a travesty. There has rarely been an awards show on television that was so badly written and executed.

Luckily, no one saw it.

The ratings for the top 150 cable shows for Sunday are now available, and the Spirit Awards are not on it. The lowest rated show recorded was just 96,000 viewers, a basketball game.

It’s not surprising the Spirit Awards didn’t make the cut off. They’ve gone as low as 65,000 in the past. I’ve no doubt this year was in that neighborhood. I’ll update if someone can find the actual number.

Everyone involved with Film Independent should be removed at this point. Hosts Nick Offerman and Megan Mullally — not ever associated with film of any kind —  couldn’t have been worse. Offerman was especially bad and offensive hosting the program. They seemed to make up half of what they were saying. Offerman knew nothing about the films or the people attending, had a scowl on his face, didn’t wear a shirt (which I still don’t get), and was dismissive of everything that was going on.

There were many embarrassing moments. But the best one was Kristen Stewart coming out toward the end, identified as chairman or something of the awards. She remarked that she’d never been to the Spirit Awards, had never been nominated in the past even though she’d made a lot of independent films. “Now I see you have to make a good one,” she cracked wise. Ouch!

The big winner for the day was “The Lost Daughter,” which won Best Feature, Directing, and Screenplay. It’s a fine film but certainly not independent as it comes from Netflix, which campaign for it vigorously. “Summer of Soul” won Best Documentary although it was an archival film pieced together from a 1969 film and distributed by Disney’s Searchlight division. And so on.

I really felt watching this desultory exercise that the era for this thing has passed. It’s over. The heyday was ten years ago. Stop it now before it gets worse.