I was going to make an entry about the horrible decision of the Oscar honcho Gil Cates to limit the face time of the designers this year but my friend Nick said it much more humorously and emphatically than I could have managed at this point so I"m just directing you to him.
You know what would warm my heart? If some of these movie stars who the Oscars are so concerned with focusing on would stand up and be counted as true collaborative professionals and make it known that they're opposed to the people who make their performances look like a million bucks being shut out of their own moments of glory. If I were Leonardo DiCaprio or Cate Blanchett or Alan Alda for instance... I'd be furious that Sandy Powell (costumes), Dante Ferretti (production design) and Thelma Schoonmaker (editor) were being treated this way.
You should be too. Hollywood should collectively be in a uproar. Not just the Oscar watchers.
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
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6 comments:
The whole idea is just destined to be an embarrassment which will quickly get dropped in 2006.
"Hey, congratulations, you won! Here's your Oscar. No, no, don't get up. All part of the service. Stay tuned; we'll be right back after these messages."
Rob
I'm more curious about this other part of the change... on the oscarwatch announcement, it sounded like in some categories (like probably the acting categories) more than one nominee will be invited up to the stage or something? And after that the winner will be announced. This would be really weird.
It will probably go down as one of those giant mishaps like Dave Letterman or Rob Lowe featuring Snow White.
I mean, Gil Cates is sort of as insulting as Chris Rock was a few weeks ago-when he said that if Jamie Foxx does not win an oscar he will take one from a sound or lighting person because, ya know, in the grand scheme of movies they don't matter- essentially saying that the technical people, purely due to them not being famous, don't deserve to get up on screen.
If someone like Sophie Okenedo or Catalina Sandino Moreno were to win (it wont happen, but its a hyperthetical) would they cut to a commercial purely because nobody outside the Oscar-nuts/cineaphiles would know them. Hardly.
They have every right to be insulted if they are not allowed on the stage to thank people. But, still, Chris Rock's comments were much more hateful and horrible.
-Glenn
Between this, my actually being unable to watch the first hour and a half live, and my being sick of both Jamie and Hilary, (neither whom I've seen, in their "lead" roles anyway, but since I'm not attached to any of the supporting nominees I'm half-hoping Jamie does a freak win in that category and thus gets disqualified for lead), the first, "maybe I won't watch" has crept into my head. Of course I'll watch, since I'm pathetic like that, but still...
Yeah, this idea is really the worst ever. Is anyone up in arms about it yet? I mean, can't someone lodge a protest, like when Major League Baseball was going to put advertisements on the bases in the All-Star Game and enough people said "WTF, no you're not"? Plus, don't they remember Lizzie Gardiner's credit-card dress at the 1994 Oscars?
hahah, YES! God, Lizzie Gardiner is great, and so was that dress. I mean, she is a costume designer but nobody expected that. That and Prescilla Queen of the Desert was excellent (Australia needs to make more camp drag queen musical comedies!).
But here's a question: Why don't costume designers ever seem to be extravegantly dressed? They usually seem to be wearing plain dresses as if they don't want to usurp the famous actresses.
I think though whenever someone is in doubt of how great and spontaneous the Oscars can be they just need to remember Lizzie's dress. Brilliant.
-Glenn
(PS; i am australian, its alright for me to be that enthusiastic okay!)
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