Rachel Zegler is not currently attending the Oscars but there is still time for the Academy, Disney, and ABC to rectify the situation.

Zegler posted in Instagram comments that she was not invited to attend. This is a problem because she’s a breakout star in Steven Spielberg’s Best Picture nominee, West Side Story. The limited seating because of social distancing is one part of the problem. Because of the distancing, there’s a good 800 or so seats that will not be used. Meanwhile, there is not the traditional lottery for Academy members this year. Another factor is this stupid decision to honor the Oscar Fan Favorite and fly people in for this nonsense. One of those three seats could easily have gone to the actress. Instead, it’s going to be on Disney to use one of their allotted tickets–typically, they go to studio executives and their guests.

Maybe it will be back to normal next year. It is not uncommon for stars of movie musicals to attend the Oscars. However, an Oscar nomination or song performance makes a big difference. It really does! West Side Story does not have any nominations for Best Original Song. In theory, a nomination in this category could make all the difference especially when performing during the Oscars.

Dune stars Jason Momoa and Josh Brolin are going to present the eight off-telecast categories. While it’s not uncommon for presents to present multiple categories, presenting eight of them is very uncommon. What this means is that the Oscars loses out on more presenters simply by taking them out of the main telecast. The previous winners tend to present the acting categories but in other instances, they use the presenters to promote upcoming films. Members of a film’s cast tend to introduce the Best Picture clip. Or it is someone with ties to the filmmaker. Why not use this instance to have Rachel Zegler introduce the film?

Here’s a solution: present all 23 categories live during the main telecast. Forget this nonsense about appeasing the people that were never going to watch the Oscars anyway. I could have told you before that this fakakta decision was going to backfire and here we are. I warned you and so did many others that this was a terrible decision.

There’s still time to undo the damage and invite Rachel Zegler to attend the Oscars. Present All 23!

The 94th Academy Awards will air live on ABC on March 27, 2022 at 8 PM ET/5 PM PT.

Please subscribe to Solzy at the Movies on Substack.