Nickelodeon’s 2014 Kids Choice Awards started out a little slow, but picked-up speed in the final half-hour. Here are the 5 highlights:
Who’s “Happy” Under the Sea? – With more than one reference to his Oscar-nominated “Despicable Me 2” song during his banter, presenter Pharrell Williams sported quite possibly his most stylish outfit yet – bright yellow SpongeBob PJs. Too bad he didn’t perform. David Hasselhoff was also spotted on the Orange Carpet in a SBSP tie. Anxious to see if he’ll make another cameo appearance in next year’s “SpongeBob Movie 2”?
The “Grown Ups” May not be Done – Chris Rock may simply have been joking, but while getting the crowd going, it seemed like he was serious about a “Grown Ups 3” in the works. Co-star Adam Sandler won Favorite Movie Actor for “GU2” later on, but didn’t mention it in his acceptance speech.
KCAs have Oscars Fever – Kids Choice resembled the most esteemed awards show, The Academy Awards, in 3 ways:
1) “Frozen” continued its Animated Feature domination
2) The first ever Nickelodeon Lifetime Achievement award to network comedy creator Dan Schneider (good idea but kinda dull for kids)
3) The ceremony went over by 6 minutes
Stunts Steal the Show – The KCAs didn’t announce the winners in every category on the show for the first time I can remember. Why? Several slime stunts and surprises filled the majority of the time. The slime rodeo featuring Shaun White was more entertaining than expected, and magician master David Blaine took part in a memorable “blink-of-an-eye and you’ll miss it” slime trick.
Save the Best for Last – Host Mark Wahlberg was pretty solid. He got his plugs in for Summer blockbuster “Transformers: Age of Extinction” (which looks good), including a skit with Optimus Prime and a few of his co-stars. The theme of the night was that it’s impossible for Wahlberg to get slimed. But with some help from Mark’s own kids, and the hilarious Kevin Hart (who’s my choice to host next year), Wahlberg got pounded with slime for nearly one minute straight. During this, he bent down to make the sign of the cross while Hart commentated: “Just like a bird dropping stuff on your head”.