Oscars 2014 live: the ceremony

“Everyone deserves not just to survive but to live,” director Steve McQueen tells the world. “This is the legacy of Solomon Northup.” He thanks his mother, who is sitting far away, at the back of the hall. She gets to her feet and waves at him wildly; a tiny figure in the distance, utterly heartbreaking and beautiful even at 500 paces.

McQueen grabs the Oscar and then jumps up and down. He’s jumping like a jackrabbit. He has just taken flight.

No sooner has Blanchett left the stage, than on comes Jennifer Lawrence to hand out the best actor award.

Say hello and wave goodbye to this year’s contenders.

• Christian Bale, who went to war with his hairpiece in American Hustle.

• Bruce Dern, who left his teeth by the tracks in the heart of Nebraska.

• Leonardo DiCaprio, who was lewd and rude on ludes in The Wolf of Wall Street.

• Chiwetel Ejiofor, who went south against his will in 12 Years a Slave.

• Matthew McConaughey, who stuffed his trunk full of meds in Dallas Buyers Club.

And the winner is ... Matthew McConaughey!

!

Daniel Day Lewis strolls to the podium to announce the nominees for the best actress Oscar. He looks utterly delighted to be here. He’s positively beaming. If we didn’t know better we’d swear he’d had an O-shot.

And the nominees for best actress are ...

• Amy Adams, slipping out the sides of American Hustle

• Cate Blanchett, mauling Martinis in Blue Jasmine

• Sandra Bullock, spinning out in Gravity

• Judi Dench, chasing nuns in Philomena

• Meryl Streep, wailing at the walls in August: Osage County

And the winner is ... Cate Blanchett!

Angelina Jolie escorts a frail but ever dignified Sidney Poitier to the stage. Just a few years back, Jolie came to this event with a satanic-red dress, one leg of which was sliced clean up to ya-ya. This time around she’s clad altogether more demurely in silver.

But forget the distractions, it’s the award for direction.

• David O’Russell shot American Hustle.

• Alfonso Cuaron played with Gravity.

• Alexander Payne steered a course through Nebraska.

• Steve McQueen broke the chains on 12 Years a Slave.

• Martin Scorsese ran down The Wolf of Wall Street.

And the Oscar goes to ... Alfonso Cuaron!

The picture desk have made their prediction for best picture. Can you guess what they’ve plugged for?

Make way for Robert De Niro and Penelope Cruz. They’re here to present the screenplay Oscar, but who saw fit to send them up there together? They could be the stars of of the wildest buddy movie this side of Twins.

“Please welcome two-time Oscar nominee John Travolta,” instructs the voice in the sky.

“Thank-you,” says John Travolta. “I love you.” I’m not sure whether he loves the audience, or us at home, or the voice in the sky. But he makes this admission with a grimace that suggests that it may be an awful confession, the thing he has wanted to get off his chest for years and years. So he’s probably addressing the voice in the sky. It’s kind of a Her scenario that he has going on.

I’m so intrigued by Travolta’s confession that I sit slack-jawed through Let it Go, the song from Frozen, which is sung with brio by Idina Menzel.

“We just crashed Twitter,” announces Ellen DeGeneres, referring to her star-stuffed selfie from earlier in the evening.

Now is the moment when the Oscar ceremony briefly leaves the land of the living to wander at length through the celebrity graveyard. Glenn Close cues up the graceful, tasteful montage and after that the ghosts come wafting through the auditoreum.

What a lot of ghosts there are this year. It’s hello and goodbye to James Gandolfini, Jim Kelly, Saul Zaentz, Roger Ebert, Paul Walker, Karen Black, Peter O’Toole, Shirley Temple and the wonderful Philip Seymour Hoffman. “We love you, we honour you, we miss you,” says Close. ”But most of all we thank you.”

The montage wraps up and the curtains part. Out comes Bette Midler. She’s singing Wind Beneath My Wings. Memo to the dearly departed. You are in a far, far better place - at least right at this moment. Every cloud has a silver lining.

Quick update on Stuart Heritage, who has been playing our drinking game:

He’s doing just fine.

The excitement, it appears, has officially reached code-red. Hadley Freeman mails in a flurry:

Paolo Sorrentino could not sound more bored talking to the press backstage. There is a pleasing Toni Servillo-like languidity to him. Or it might just be that he is really uninterested in endless questions about what his win means to Italy

Give it up for Pink. She’s here to sing a medley of songs to celebrate the 75th anniversary of The Wizard of Oz. The film, not the book. Or the wizard.

”If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow, why oh why can’t I?” sings Pink. But I think the question is merely rhetorical. The audience respond with a standing ovation. Not one of them attempts to answer her.

Jonah Hill has a slice. Martin Scorsese has a slice. I’m almost feeling sorry for the Oscar winners who have already gone backstage. No pizza for them.

And the delivery guy? A method actor as it turns out.

The poor guys who won the documentary Oscar had the misfortune to be backstage and talking to the press when it was announced on the screens above that Lupita had won. The whole room as one burst out in joy, much to the documentary dudes’ bafflement

Christoph Waltz hops up to pay tribute to this year’s supporting actress nominees. Just for the record, he thinks they’re all stunning. He’s not fussy. He likes all of them just the same.

Anyhow, moving on, let’s recap the stunners.

• Sally Hawkins, who played sweet to Blanchett’s sour in Blue Jasmine.

• Jennifer Lawrence, who blew the doors off the microwave in American Hustle.

• Lupita Nyong’o, who played tragic Patsy in 12 Years a Slave.

• Julia Roberts, who showed up for the funeral in August: Osage County.

• June Squibb, who flashed her pants in the graveyard on her way through Nebraska.

And the Oscar goes too … Lupita Nyong’o!

A win for Lupita means a win for Stuart Heritage. His prize? A swig of Benolyn!

Ellen DeGeneres steps down amid the throng to corral the guests into the ultimate Oscar selfie. It’s a little spooky, like something out of a Don DeLillo novel. The most photographed people photographing themselves, live on camera, watched by millions.

She gathers Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, Meryl Streep, various others and has them mug into the phone. She them requests us all to tweet it, which we shall duly do. “Oh God, I’ve never tweeted before!” says Streep, though I’m not sure DeGeneres was referring to her in particular.

Of course, we’re used to that sort of glamour in the Guardian office. Gravity’s doing well, so here’s our latest selfie

Hadley Freeman mails with more insights from behind the scenes at the sausage factory.

Every winner is expected to send a message to each journalist’s nation, eg “I’m from China - the Chinese people would like to know whether you would make movie with a Chinese crew?”
Also, every nominee is asked where they will keep their Oscar. Every winner is like, “Um, why do you care? Are you planning to steal it?”

Exit Tyler Perry, enter Brad Pitt. He’s here to introduce U2 and U2 are here to play Ordinary Love, their song from the Mandela biopic. Bono appears to have gone up about three octaves since the last time I heard him. Maybe it has something to do with the shorts that everyone seems to be name-checking at this year’s Oscars.

How many more Oscar songs do we have to sit through tonight? I’m still hoping they’ll play Alone Yet Not Alone, the theme from the Christian faith movie that was banned at the eleventh hour. Fingers crossed they can get Jack Nicholson to sing it.

Meanwhile, Meryl’s had another mention. Stu Heritage knows what that means ...

All hail The Great Beauty, Paolo Sorrentino’s swooning, ravishing satire of the demi-monde of Rome, arguably the standout picture of 2013. It has just won the foreign film Oscar. On stage Sorrentino thanks Rome and Naples, Fellini and Scorsese. He’s listing his inspirations and one feels he could go on and on.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” interrupts the voice in the sky. “Please welcome Tyler Perry.” What a glorious juxtaposition. It brings us bumping down to earth. What does one do after watching The Great Beauty? Where else can one possibly go? Please welcome Tyler Perry.

Hadley Freeman mails from the bowels of the Dolby.

I’m backstage in the press room which is the most surreal experience of my life. Jared Leto just described it as an “orgy”, so that should sum up the weirdness. Even Leto was weirded out.

They’re giving them out to Steve Martin and Angelina Jolie and Angela Lansbury and Danny Dyer. They’re giving them away to everyone. Well, possibly not to Danny Dyer, at least not yet. Amid the rash of honorary Oscars it’s hard not to get confused.

Geoffrey Rush just asked Angela Lansbury whether she is “the living definition of range”. That makes her sound like a ranch in Oklahoma.

The moon rises at the back of the stage at the Dolby theatre and the lights are dimmed. On the steps sit Karen O and her doting male guitarist Ezra Koenig. They have come (fittingly enough) to sing The Moon Song, the dreamy, slightly drippy ballad from the Spike Jonze film Her. The audience’s applause is a little muted. I’m guessing Jack Nicholson has nodded off in his seat.

Pharrell’s performance of Happy made many people happy, including happy Meryl Streep and HAPPY Lupita Nyong’o HB

If you’re one of the people searching Twitter for Ellen DeGeneres, then this is your fault. HB

Make way, make way for Pharrell Williams, who appears to have found his hat and dropped his shorts and is now blazing his way through Happy, the Oscar-nominated song from Despicable Me 2. Happy is bright and Happy is bouncy. Listening to Happy is like drinking a gallon of Sunny Delight while being spun round and round on a fairground waltzer.

If so, the crowd don’t seem that keen to join up:

So it’s already a golden night for Jared Leto. But the upside for the losing nominees (for Abdi, Hill and the rest) is that they all take home an official Oscar goodie bag worth a reported $80,000. This bag contains all manner of riches. There are luxury holiday vouchers and a home spa system. There is “horse shampoo” and a pepper-spray gun. Most intriguingly of all, the bag contains a “vaginal rejuvenation” treatment known as the O-shot. Something to bear in mind, what with Mother’s Day coming up.

The Oscar goodie bag may sound outlandish to you and me, but it offers a fascinating snapshot of modern-day celebrity. Its contents provide a kind of composite portrait of the Hollywood thoroughbred. When the likes of Sandra Bullock and Julia Roberts are not off gallivanting on a luxury vacation, they can be found tottering around Beverly Hills, reeking of the stables and pursued by horse rustlers. They brandish pepper-spray guns as they dart, loins aflame, from their limo to the lunch.

Up steps Ann Hathaway (billed as “the first white presenter of the night”) to announce the best supporting actor prize.

Here come the contenders.

• Barkhad Adbi, the desperate Somali pirate in Captain Phillips.

• Bradley Cooper, the player that was played in American Hustle.

• Michael Fassbender, the sulphurous plantation owner out of 12 Years a Slave.

• Jonah Hill, who played broker house Egor to The Wolf of Wall Street.

• Jared Leto, tottering on heels in Dallas Buyers Club.

And the winner is ... Jared Leto!

And a win for Jared means a beer for Stu. Lucky old Stu.

The 86th Academy Awards are hosted by Ellen DeGeneres, whose easy, convivial manner strikes an immediate contrast with Seth McFarlane’s ill-judged japery in the same role last year. “I hosted this event seven years ago,” DeGeneres points out. “And I’m honoured they invited me back so quickly.”

From here her routine pokes gentle fun at nominees Barkhad Abdi, Jared Leto, Jennifer Lawrence and June Squibb, pausing only to single out a brilliant Liza Minnelli impersonator who may, in fact, turn out to be Liza Minnelli. “Good job, sir!” DeGeneres tells her (or possibly him). Minnelli responds with a pained, frozen grimace.

Dallas Buyers Club, she adds, is a film about “people who have sex at rodeos”. Jonah Hill is praised for his full frontal appearance in The Wolf of Wall Street. “Jonah, you showed me something in that film that I haven’t seen in a long time,” DeGeneres tells him.

The night, she concludes, can go one of two ways. Either 12 Years a Slave wins everything or the voters are racist. And with that we’re pitched, without further ado, into the first prize of the night.

Stuart Heritage is live-drinking the Academy Awards, following the rules of our Oscars drinking game. Let’s see how he’s getting on ...

The carpet circus is over, the ceremony is about to begin. It is at this point that we bid a sad farewell to the likes of Ryan Seacrest, Robin Roberts and the bloody carpet and step inside the Dolby theatre. The curtain comes up on the 86th Academy Awards. And not a moment too soon.

Quick conflab with JCM confirms that this dress is hot. Robbie knows it too. You can tell from her eyebrows. IF

Why has Angelina brought a Bradford bouncer as her date? IF

Alarming scenes on the blood-red carpet outside the Dolby theatre. “The crowds are all screaming!” reports Robin Roberts, clutching her microphone. “And when the crowds are all screaming, it’s hard to tell who they’re screaming for.” Maybe they’re just screaming, Robin. Maybe they have all collectively gone insane.

Undeterred, the celebrities keep filing past the screaming hordes on the sodden bleachers. Jonah Hill thinks they are screaming for Leonardo DiCaprio. Lupita Nyong’o explains that her Prada dress was “inspired by champagne bubbles”. The crowd, in the meantime, continues to scream.

The carpet has taken over. The carpet is king. Aren’t the Academy Awards meant to start a few minutes from now? Shouldn’t everyone be making there way to their seats by now? Apparently not. The guests are still arriving, the hosts are in full spate. Everybody, it seems, is still stuck outside the Dolby theatre, squishing back and forth across a rug that has turned as red and viscid as beetroot soup?

“Woo hoo!” scream the hosts. “It’s Jamie Foxx!” They are in their element, they can keep this up all night. Maybe they don’t even realise that there are awards to announce. Maybe they think that there’s just these cameras, this carpet, and that the door to the Dolby leads to nowhere, or possibly to death. Apologies for the morbidity. Stare too long at a blood-red carpet and the whole experience starts to feel a tad existential. “Woo hoo, the carpet looks like freshly spilled guts! Woo hoo, Jamie Foxx has just trodden in entrails!” For the love of God, please send the guests inside.

Sandra Bullock’s done it, so did Charlize Theron, Emma Watson and Kerry Washington. It works for us. And BTW Bullock looks excellent. Navy blue but in a warm way. Nice counterbalance too between the side hair on the left and the pleated detail on the right. IF

Remember, when Gwynnie wore the Tom Ford white dress with the matching cape? Kate does. Also, the pose is weird, it looks like her left leg is trying to escape. JCM

The palest of pale pink chiffon with a grosgrain ribbon belt. Sounds sugary and bleurgh right? But somehow PC has made it look modern and effortless. We stand in awe. IF

See it’s not what you wear, it’s how your wear it. Meryl is wearing a monochrome gown like it’s a sweatshirt and jeans. It’s wardrobe confidence verging on cockiness. IF

She won’t be laughing when they rip open the envelope and call the accountant to the stage.

That’s the message, loud and clear, from Emma Watson in Vera Wang. The T-shirt shape is cool, not prim, the gunmetal shade is a bit rock’n’roll. And if we’re not mistaken she’s flying the flag for British fashion with an Anya Hindmarch crisp packet clutch. Full marks. JCM

The guy on the left is grinning because he’s just scored out Cate Blanchett’s name and written in his own.

Cate Blanchett is in a different fashion league from your average starlet. She has this sexy-froideur thing going on. This Armani dress seems to be made of capiz shells, so I am a bit worried about whether she can sit down? But that’s the sort of thing us pedestrian, non-Blanchett specimens worry about. JCM

Dior pay her a lot of money. Not sure what the falling over is about. Anyway, I have been hoping she would wear this shape, the straight-lined column, because (a) it’s a bit more fashion and less Hollywood and (b) the Princess gown was cute but with the short hair this feels more grown-up and modern. Seriously, if she could only learn to walk she’d have the red carpet nailed. JCM

Fresh from her insensible, alcohol-fuelled tumble on the sodden carpet, Jennifer Lawrence finds herself cornered by one of those pesky TV hostesses. ”Who are you wearing?” demands the TV hostess and Jennifer Lawrence replies that she is wearing Dior.

Just to be clear: Jennifer Lawrence is not literally wearing Christian Dior. What Lawrence means is that she is wearing a dress (red, pretty) which was devised by designers at the Dior fashion house. So relax; it’s OK. Jennifer Lawrence has not rocked up to the Oscars like some demented backwoods Buffalo Bill, with the rotting skin and pelt of Christian Dior plastered to her naked limbs. Possibly with her teeth filed down to points, just to complete the image. That would be repellent.

But we digress. She is wearing a dress.

Well it would be if it weren’t on Anne Hathaway. This is Mirrorball Chic. Whoever designed this dress and I promise to find out in a bit, was in a nightclub, looked up and thought, “Eureka! Black dress, exploded mirrorball breastplate, that’s it.” IF

Paging a seamstress! This dress is not fitting the divine Julia Roberts, like at all. Should be tighter at the waist above the peplum section and pulled up a bit on the shoulders. Someone help her out with a bulldog clip or something. IF

Some (Bafta for instance) may claim that Gravity is the best British hope at this year’s Oscars, but those of a more sober and sensible stripe are probably rooting for Philomena, which is also up for the crowning best picture prize. Steve Coogan, the film’s co-writer, co-star and producer, has just walked right by Hadley’s perch on the bleachers.

On running up to collect her best actress Oscar last year, Jennifer Lawrence tripped on the stairs and momentarily went down. On arriving to (possibly) collect her second Academy Award tonight, she has just managed to repeat the feat. Cynics are already speculating that she’s staging her pratfalls. Alternatively she may be loaded to the gills. If she’s this unsteady at this point of the evening, just imagine what state she’ll be in when she comes to read out her acceptance speech.

Do we like the clotted cream jacket? On balance yes we do. I’m calling this the contingency look because he can whip off the jacket at any point and still have a posh look on with that black waistcoat. See, he’s thought of stuff. IF

It’s Kerry Washington and she’s gorgeous. So why did she slip on the hotel bedsheets and why didn’t she get someone to steam the dress for her? Could she literally not get the staff? IF

Back in the TV studio, the fashion pundits tackle the elephant in the living room.

“Can a dress make or break an actress?” asks the first.

“Yes,” replies the second, without a moment’s hesitation. “I think it can.”

Because they’re just a bit weird and ”underwear solution“ ish aren’t they? IF

I am a bit obsessed with Glenn Close. I saw her IRL at a fashion party once and OMG her skin, luminous, literally LUMINOUS, and a mean dancer. Also, she wears dresses with sleeves, or matching jackets (I think this is a bolero?) on the red carpet, which is excellent. Not sure who this is by, but in 2012 she wore a dress and matching tux by Zac Posen. JCM

Sally Hawkins is wearing a pearly Crusader look. No need to look all apologetic about that Sal. IF

In case you hadn’t heard already, this year’s Academy Awards shall be hosted by Ellen DeGeneres. Here she is in what we presume she will be wearing throughout tonight’s ceremony. “I an [sic] happy,” she declares happily.

Make way, make way for the excellent Amy Adams, Oscar nominated for her role in David O Russell’s American Hustle. “You’ve just got the biggest roar of the night,” chirrups E! hostess Robin Roberts, though I’m betting she says that to all the guests.

Adams goes on to explain that she is wearing Gucci, and that she loves the 50s, and that her dress is a homage to Kim Novak in Vertigo. Adams’s dress looks OK. And here endeth the fashion critique.

Because Lupita Nyong’o, the nominee everyone wanted to dress, is wearing Prada. Why don’t more people wear baby blue? It looks amazing against the red carpet. It looks soft and dreamy compared to all the lead-lined corset gowns. But, can I be picky? Lupita has been building a rep for bold fashion choices and this is a bit safe. Also, the headband looks like the kind that crazy parents put on baby girls who have no hair. JCM

Sticking with sartorial matters, Hadley Freeman mails with an update on the state of Pharrell Williams, who appears to have rocked up to the Academy Awards dressed as little Jimmy Krankie.

Pharrell update: no hat, yes shorts.
End of Pharrell update.

You sort of have to be French to pull this off. As my colleague Imogen points out, on a norm, this would like like something from Warehouse circa 2005. But Julie looks foxy. Also, love the double hands-on-hips pose, which is unexpectedly Kardashian. JCM

Obviously I feel I have the whole Oscar fashion shebang well covered on this blog. But if, for some reason, you require fashion correspondents who are EVEN MORE knowledgeable and discriminating than me, bespoke dedicated coverage can be found right here.

...but we quite like Coogan’s red carpet roar thingie. Particularly since he’s gone for a double-breast. No apologies for overuse of the fashion singular. IF

We’re calling this look (modelled by Naomi Watts) Done Down on the fashion desk. We like it a lot - red carpet flat hair. Oddly, it works. Love the red lips and the black shoes with the cloudy dress, but that necklace is far too similar to one Liz McDonald was wearing on Coronation Street on Friday IF

Out on the carpet comes the great Sidney Poitier, an Oscar winner himself way back in the 60s and a trailblazer for generations of African-American actors that followed. “How special is it to be here as an Oscar winner?” demands the ABC television host and then repeats the question with the volume turned up. “HOW SPECIAL IS TO BE HERE AS AN OSCAR WINNER?”

“Oh, well,” says Poitier. “It’s something I remember.” The red carpet interview slightly falls apart from here.

Out on the carpet, Ryan Seacrest is currently telling a confused 84-year-old woman that he is officially, right this second “live on E!”. Small wonder she looks so unnerved.

Chris Rock tweets from somewhere or other. Conceivably the Smithsonian.

Do we need to give some clarification here? We’re assuming that Rock is pledging his support for the film 12 Years a Slave, which is up for nine Oscars at tonight’s event. He is not saying that he is rooting for slavery, as such, merely for a film that tells us that slavery is bad.

At least that’s what we think he means to say. He could, just possibly, be referring to the cleaners who have just sucked up 60 gallons of rainwater from the red carpet.

This is Amy Adams in a navy blue dress from Gucci. It’s perfectly nice, but it’s not exciting. Good ingredients, but no sizzle. Next! IF

Best things about this tux shorts number from Pharrell? The fact that you can so tell he’s moisturized his legs. Look - shiny calves! Also loving the studied awkwardness of the pair of them together with their mix and match tux actions. Good work. IF

She has no umbrella and she’s tweeting in the rain. Here are the latest pictures from Hadley Freeman, live and loving it outside the Dolby theatre. First up, it’s Liza.

Second up, it’s Squibb.

And third up, it’s Harvey Weinstein’s honoured guest.

Guests arriving for the 86th annual Academy Awards must first brave the E! team on the red carpet outside the Dolby theatre, and the ringleader of the celebrity circus is Mr Ryan Seacrest, who comes to cajole and flatter and occasionally kiss. Here are some facts about your host for the night.

• Ryan Seacrest used to recite the pledge of allegiance over his high school PA system, sparking a lifelong love of broadcasting.
• Ryan Seacrest is five-foot-nine-inches tall.
• Ryan Seacrest was born with a tail that he had surgically removed ahead of his high school prom.
• One of the above facts is entirely made up.

How to best explain the cultural phenomenon that is Ryan Seacrest. Far better to leave the task to the man himself:

My company is in the business of content, delivering content, so whether you see it or taste it or hear it or smell it, that’s what I do every day.

First you taste him, then you hear him. And then you smell him. Mr Ryan Seacrest will be with us shortly.

In the TV studios, the pundits are previewing the red carpet arrivals. Lupita Nyong’o, we are told, is not just the breakout star of 12 Years a Slave (centrepiece of which is a scene of her being whipped senseless for taking a bar of soap); she’s also “the breakout star of the red carpet” and this year’s hottest fashion icon. As the resident expert puts it:

She’s not letting the clothes wear her. She’s wearing the clothes.

Fair enough - but here at the Guardian we’ve been doing that for years. Woe betide the pair of flannel trousers that tries to wear us, or the crumpled plaid shirt that gets ideas above its station. We’ll wear that sucker until it begs for mercy and then economy wash it to within an inch of its life. Nyong’o could learn a lot from the sharp-dressed hacks in the Kings Cross newsroom.

This is how things are looking inside the Guardian office. No view of the red carpet (except on the TV), but we’re just five minutes from the tube. Plus (it seems) we have a greater head count than our American cousins at the New York Times.

Liza Minnelli has arrived, dressed for a Smurfs’ pyjama party. I can’t work out which is more awesome: the blue streak in the hair, or that she hasn’t bothered to change out of the flat shoes she wore for the journey. JCM

It’s a stance that says, “yep, I’m ready.” It’s a green silk dress but she’s wearing it like a red carpet riot shield. IF

Glamour for us stretches to a shirt we’ve worn for only three days. Luckily our friends on the fashion desk are on hand to comment on the Oscar guests’ gladrags and handbags. Look out for their posts over the next hour and a bit. They’ll be the (marginally) less snarky ones. HB

Spare a thought for the luminaries of world cinema who are too art-house, too unfamiliar, or just too foreign to spark a delirious greeting from the likes of Ryan Seacrest or Robin Roberts. Wong Kar Wai, for instance, is widely held to be one of the greatest film-makers of his generation, the creator of Chungking Express, Happy Together and the peerless In the Mood For Love.

Plop him down in Cannes or Venice and they would be hailing him as a god. But at the Oscars he’s no one. He might as well be Charlize Theron’s minder, or one of the luckless cleaners sucking water through a straw. He is reduced to standing forlornly in the rain, taking pictures of himself.

Proof, it proof were needed, that God has hated the Oscars ever since King of Kings failed to sweep the board back in 1961: it’s been raining hard in Hollywood. Outside the theatre, the Oscar statues have been shrouded under plastic and the red carpet has become like borscht. Incidentally, isn’t it high time we had a King of Kings sequel? Perhaps called King of King of Kings.

Hadley Freeman mails from the deluge:

Apparently they had to suck about 60 gallons of rain water out of the red carpet this morning.

I’m not sure who this hard-working, anonymous ”they” might be. It conjures up a depressing image of a band of minimum wage cleaners on their hands and knees outside the Dolby, each personally sucking water through a straw and breaking only to stagger, swollen-bellied, towards the latrines. Perhaps the hosts of E! can interview these people later, if only to get their side of the Oscar night experience.

If the thought of sitting through the 86th Academy Awards in a sober state is too much to bear, then fear not, we have an alternative. You can now watch the stars though the eyes of a drunk courtesy of our grand (and possibly illegal) Oscar night drinking game. Stuart Heritage slurs the rules and then prepares to lead the way. Stuart’s playing coy, but he’s half-cut already and as purely excited as a small child at Christmas.

Hadley mails from the bleachers where the forecast is middling:

For some reason the Academy organisers decided in their infinite wisdom to take down the covering over the red carpet and press bleachers, even though it has been raining for 3 days. So the press now all has wet bottoms and are very grumpy.

But no matter! The MC is warming up the red carpet (”Who here loves The Ellen Show?!??!!!”) and the sun is finally coming out. We are set to start.

After the Oscars are done and dusted, we are hoping that Hadley will be heading off to yet another of Harvey Weinstein’s famous parties. She went to the last one, just after the Baftas, and had such a whale of a time that Mr Weinstein promptly joined her on the dance floor (aka wrote a furious clarification).

At the risk of letting light in on magic, it should be noted that we are actually blogging these Oscars from the heart of the Guardian newsroom in wintry central London. But our esteemed colleague Hadley Freeman is on the ground in Los Angeles and shall be reporting in throughout the night.

And look - here she is, living the dream on the Oscar red carpet.

In the meantime, please feel free to send us your own Oscar night pictures, whether you’re parading yourself outside the Dolby theatre or hosting a private party at home. You can tweet us @GuardianFilm or email adam.boult@theguardian.com. Alternatively you can simply ring our editor, Alan Rusbridger, on his mobile throughout the night to let him know how you’re getting on.

Buckle up, because we’re in this for the long haul. The next few hours sees the awards race reach its climax. 12 Years a Slave wades into battle against American Hustle, while Gravity attempts to pull weight in the best picture category. The latest odds suggest that it’s looking good for Matthew McConaughey and Cate Blanchett, Jennifer Lawrence and Jared Leto, The Act of Killing and The Great Beauty. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. The night is still young and there’s a red carpet to walk.

The annual celebrity parade kicks off shortly, gleefully hosted (as it is every year) by the Amazing Smirking Imps of E!. For the rest us, there is still ample time to kick back, pour out a stiff drink and preview the Oscars at leisure.

Here’s what we’ve cooked up by way of an appetiser ...

• Ten things to look out for at tonight’s ceremony
• Ellen DeGeneres: The Oscar host who came out of the cold
• Who’s won what at the award ceremonies leading up to the Oscars
• The Guardian film show looks ahead to the night
• The Oscars in numbers - facts and stats on Hollywood’s starriest night
• Photos from Life magazine of golden era Hollywood stars at the Oscars
• Peter Bradshaw nominates his 10 best Oscar moments. Ever
• Hadley Freeman reports from Hollywood
• David Cox on the British credentials of 12 Years a Slave
• Profiling Captain Phillips star Barkhad Abdi: from limo driver to nominee
• Stuart Heritage presents his alternative Oscars
• Nine Guardian writers pick a best picture favourite
• Check out the winners of Oscar’s cheeky cousin, The Razzies

Plus we’ve a whole mess of other Oscar-related trifles.