This first started percolating after the Grammys, but now that the Oscars are almost here, I can offer the refined version.

In my vision, all the nominees for a category would go on stage, much like a beauty pageant.

However, when the winner was named, that person would not give a speech. Instead, they would go and sit on a throne, their back to the audience.

Then the losers (and face facts, that's what they are at this point) would have to go before them one by one. Then, while on bended knee, they would have to tell the winner that their performance/film/whatever was better, and then briefly explain why -- or better yet, why they sucked.

The winner would be encouraged to have a superior, triumphalist smirk on their faces.

After they were finished, the losers would have to submissively bow or curtsey to the winner, whichever is most appropriate.

The losers would go offstage as a group to the nastiest boos and catcalls imaginable. The winner would get rapturous cheers.

Hey, I'd watch that! :)

And according to this Globe and Mail story, the producers are trying to spice things up. An excerpt:

Faced with declining viewership (last year's show was the second-least-watched ceremony by Americans in more than a decade) — and previous Oscars that have clocked in at more than three hours — the academy this year is insisting that individual acceptance speeches be, above all, “interesting and memorable.”

If a winner “pulls out a list and starts to read it,” that's pretty much a guarantee that he or she is going to be cut off right away, an Oscar spokesperson said Wednesday.

Even without a list, the famous musical cut-off — when the orchestra drowns out a winner's speech — “still could happen,” she said, particularly if the speech is felt to be going on too long. Winners are being told they have 45 seconds to make their speeches.