UPDATE: It’s official: Lady Gaga will not perform “Hold My Hand” at the Oscars this year.
Oscars executive producer and showrunner Glenn Weiss confirmed the news that Gaga, who landed her fourth career nomination for the “Top Gun: Maverick” song “Hold My Hand,” will not be performing during a creative team press conference on Wednesday afternoon.
“We invited all five nominees. We have a great relationship with Lady Gaga and her camp. She is in the middle of shooting a movie right now. Here, we are honoring the movie industry and what it takes to make a movie after a bunch of back and forth…It didn’t feel like she can get a performance to the caliber that we’re used to with her and that she is used to. So, she is not going to perform on the show,” Weiss said.
All of this year’s other nominees for best original song at the Oscars have been confirmed for a performance at the ceremony on March 12 — minus Gaga. In the Oscars tradition (most years), all nominated songs are sung during the ceremony. Rihanna (“Lift Me Up”), Sofia Carson and Diane Warren (“Applause”), Stephanie Hsu, David Byrne and Son Lux (“This Is a Life”) and Rahul Sipligunj and Kaala Bhairava (“Naatu Naatu”) will all be making appearances this year.
Right now, Gaga is in the midst of filming “Joker: Folie à Deux.” Director Todd Phillips shared the first image of the star as Harley Quinn on Valentine’s Day opposite “Joker” actor Joaquin Phoenix. She is reportedly playing her version of the DC Comics character as a psychiatrist who finds herself smitten with the Joker before taking on his villainous ways. Warner Bros. will release the film in theaters Oct. 9, 2024 — five years to the day after the release of the first film.
When she was nominated, Gaga took to social media to share her gratitude. She wrote, “Thank you so much to the Academy for nominating my song ‘Hold My Hand’ for an Oscar this year! Writing this song for the film ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ was a deep and powerful experience that I will never forget. So grateful for the magic of music and cinema.” Giving props to her co-writer Bloodpop, she signed off with, “I’m on set filming now big love to little monsters!”
