After downplaying the glam - and isn't that really what the show's all about? - for the last two years due to 9/11 and then the war in Iraq, the Academy Awards promise to be in full glitz mode this year:

Celebrities will be strutting the red carpet again after Oscar organizers scrapped its glitzy arrivals area last year in deference to the U.S.-led war effort in Iraq. With the passage of time, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences figured it was safe to make merry again for the 76th annual Oscars. [AP]

This year's main Oscar cause celebre is shaping up to be environmentally friendly automobiles, with several stars eschewing limousines and SUVs in favor of electric cars or gasoline-electric hybrids. Among them are nominees Diane Keaton , Marcia Gay Harden , and Keisha Castle-Hughes, 13, star of "The Whale Rider" and the youngest contender ever for best actress.

But the Oscars will be anything but austere. A year after organizers literally rolled up the red carpet and kept fans away from arrivals in keeping with somber wartime sentiments, the glitz is back in full force.

Spectator bleachers have been reinstalled, along with 500 feet of red carpet along Hollywood Boulevard, and comedian Joan Rivers will return with her equally tart-tongued daughter, Melissa, to dish out fashion commentary for pre-show viewers. [Reuters]

Since 1996, celebrities have strolled down the Academy Awards (news - web sites) red carpet trembling in fear of being lambasted by Rivers or her daughter, Melissa, as they work their popular pre-Oscar fashion shtick for the E! Network.

But actresses now hire armies of dress designers, plastic surgeons, hairdressers and stylists to face the fashion-police glare of Rivers and others on Oscar night.

"Unfortunately, I think they're playing it safer because of us. I think we should get an award from the stylists of America," sighs Rivers.

Love 'em or hate 'em, the Rivers' red-carpet rants have turned the awards into more about what celebs wear than what they win. Actors can go home without one of the coveted statuettes, but Gawd Fohbid, as Rivers would muse in her New York accent, that they should be the butt of her sartorial slings.

And whether one admits it or not, the Rivers' foul-mouthed, off-colored, live pre-show, where every star is fair game for their acid-tongued reviews, has become the guilty viewing pleasure of millions, setting ratings records year after year.

....The Riverses themselves are often the butt of jokes for their often tacky guerilla-style humor and for mixing up celebrities and designer names. They both shrug off the criticism.

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