The 2023 Oscars ceremony is expected to attract a huge viewership, with people tuning in to watch the first one since Will Smith controversially smacked Chris Rock in the face.
The Hollywood actor, 54, made global headlines last year after storming on stage at the star-studded ceremony and slapping 57-year-old Chris over a joke made about Jada Pinkett Smith.
Will has since resigned from the Academy and has been banned from attending for 10 years.
A celebrity PR expert has said the "jaw dropping incident" will be on everyone's minds, with all eyes expected to be on this year's ceremony.
Mayah Riaz, celebrity PR, told The Mirror: "There is no doubt that the Will Smith slap is a jaw dropping incident. It will always be remembered as the most shocking Oscar moment.
"It can go one of two ways during the ceremony; he will be the butt of all jokes or people will steer clear of mentioning it. The latter will be the best approach for the academy."
She added: "All eyes will be on the ceremony, which is great because we have seen that the ratings have been falling in recent years.
"However, it needs to be a truly fabulous night of glitz, glamour and entertainment. In order to make sure the viewers keep watching, Hollywood really needs to do what it does best and make it a show stopper of a ceremony."
Nominations for the 2023 Oscars were announced on Tuesday, with Everything Everywhere All At Once dominating with 11 nods.
Colin Farrell and Bill Nighy both received their first Best Actor Oscar nominations. Farrell was nominated for The Banshees Of Inisherin and Nighy for his role in Living.
Also nominated in the category were Paul Mescal for Aftersun, Austin Butler for Elvis and Brendan Fraser for The Whale.
The big blockbusters nominated for Best Picture included Avatar: The Way Of Water, Top Gun: Maverick and Elvis.
Speaking about the nominations, Mayah said: "The Woman King was an early Oscar contender and the fact it didn’t receive a nomination will come as a huge blow."
She added: "Janelle Monae's role in Glass Onion was not recognised, which is another blow as it was expected to be recognised. The film itself was a hit.
"What is surprising is the number of nominations Everything Everywhere All at Once has received. It wasn’t expected to be such a hit."
Taylor Swift was missing from the nominations, despite recently receiving a nomination for a Golden Globe Award.
Mayah told us: "I think that Taylor Swift being snubbed for her song Carolina from Where the Crawdads Sing was because the film itself wasn’t Oscar worthy. More it was merely a good film adaption from a popular book.
"The academy has been accused of many things. The Oscars history is chock full of shock, controversy and backlash.
"They needed to show a diverse array of contenders, so choosing other songs will have been important to them in order to avoid further controversy."
She added: "Having Rihanna and Lady Gaga potentially perform at the event will also be a huge ratings winner too. It’ll be the main talking point, thus avoiding everyone still talking about Will Smith."
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