5:32 p.m. Stewart congratulates Stiller on his green unitard. "It's nice to have proof that he's really Jewish."

5:34 p.m. "Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit" takes the prize for animated feature. That must be something of a bittersweet salve for DreamWorks, which really took it on the chin for the film's disappointing box office.

5:37 p.m. Dolly Parton comes out in a form-fitting white suit. She sings. She sounds great. She looks – well, her body dimensions still look as impossible as ever.

5:41 p.m. Now do you realize why this show runs long? We're nearly 45 minutes into the Oscars, and we've done just one major category. What else have we had? Well, a 15-minute so-so monologue. Two minor prizes. A live performance. Lotsa filler.

And they wonder why young people are tuning out.

5:43 p.m. Stewart returns from a commercial break: "And that's why I think Scientology is right not just for this city, but the entire country."

5:46 p.m. The Wilson bros., Owen and Luke, give a prize to filmmaker Martin McDonagh ("Six Shooter") for live action short. Then a bit of corporate synergy from Oscar presenter ABC, which is owned by Walt Disney Co.: Chicken Little, star of Disney's eponymous cartoon dud, presents for animated short film.

5:50 p.m. Jennifer Aniston, presenting the Oscar for costume design, gives the award to Colleen Atwood of "Memoirs of a Geisha" –- probably the last prize that film will win tonight. Still that annoying background music as Atwood speaks.

5:53 p.m. Russell Crowe comes out to introduce a montage of films based on historical figures ("Gandhi," "Young Mr. Lincoln," "Chaplin," etc.). And Crowe doesn't slug anyone.

5:58 p.m. Will Ferrell and Steve Carell come out to present the makeup award. The joke is that they're ridiculously over-made-up. They both look like radiation victims.

6:02 p.m. Stewart congratulates "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" on winning the Oscar for makeup, but tells the audience that he was surprised "Cinderella Man" wasn't honored: "Imagine the difficulty of making Russell Crowe look like he got into a fight."

Then Stewart gives us a whiff of the kind of political humor sadly missing from his opening monologue, pointing to a huge Oscar statue on stage and telling the crowd: "Do you think if we all got together and pulled this down, democracy would flourish in Hollywood?"

6:07 p.m. Something of a surprise! Rachel Weisz, seven months pregnant, takes best supporting actress win for "The Constant Gardener," beating out Catherine Keener of "Capote" and Michelle Williams of "Brokeback Mountain." Weisz takes the classy route of thanking not only co-workers but "Gardener" novelist John Le Carre.

6:12 p.m. More than an hour into this thing, and is any film dominating? Uh .... well..... no.

6:14 p.m. Lauren Bacall presents a tribute to American film noir, but with her tremulous, halting delivery, she seems to be having great difficulty reading the prompter.