Every year, the Oscars ceremony runs an “In Memoriam” segment, honoring the people in the film industry who have died over the previous year. And every year, they leave out somebody, like Joan Rivers, Powers Boothe, or Tom Petty the year Eddie Vedder actually sang one of Petty’s songs to background the segment. One year, the Academy even included a person who was still alive.
But this year the omits seem especially egregious in the segment backed by Billie Eilish’s extra-long performance of The Beatles’ “Yesterday,” which featured luminaries like actor/singer Doris Day, director Stanley Donen, and composer Andre Previn. Unmentioned Descendants star Cameron Boyce was only 20 when he died of an epileptic seizure in July, and had appeared in Adam Sandler’s Grown Ups franchise. Also left-out 90210 star Luke Perry was 52, and had appeared in a few more movies, like Buffy The Vampire Slayer, 8 Seconds, Normal Life, and a film that was nominated for multiple Oscars that very night, Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood. Notably, Boyce and Perry are both included in the Oscars’ online “In Memoriam” 163-slide show, while the televised segment usually hovers around 50 names mentioned.
Unsurprisingly, many fans have taken their rage to Twitter to protest the omission of actors like Perry, Boyce, comedic actor Tim Conway, and horror legend Sid Haig, leading hashtags like #LukePerry to trend today. With Robert Conrad and Orson Bean, who both died rather recently, time would be a factor, but many of these actors, like Rene Auberjonois and Michael J. Pollard, died months before the ceremony. Honestly, if they can squeeze a bizillion montages as well as a performance of a 2002 song into the ceremony, surely they can take a little extra time to feature more of Hollywood’s notables in the “In Memoriam” segment.