Was it all stage-managed from the start? The "will he, won't he?" battle over Sacha Baron Cohen's appearance at today's Oscars ceremony has ended with victory for the comic actor, who will now be a focus of attention for this year's awards.
For some, however, the last-minute change allowing the actor to attend in character as his latest alter ego has all the signs of a slick marketing exercise.
Cohen had been barred from appearing in character as the outlandish Admiral General Shabazz Aladeen, from his film The Dictator, about the leader of a fictional Middle Eastern country called Wadiya.
Oscars organisers relented when a producer of the show revealed Cohen would now be showing up in Hollywood in costume. He would not only walk on the red carpet wearing a full beard, wig and elaborate dress uniform but would attend the show, raising the prospect of some sort of stunt during the ceremony.
Cohen - or rather Aladeen - reacted in triumph. "Victory is ours! Today the Mighty Nation of Wadiya triumphed over the Zionist snakes of Hollywood," he said on a fake Wadiya website set up to promote the film.
