So how was your Oscar® night?

[thatcrazycajun]

The 'Bird and I went to see the road-company production of Monty Python's Spamalot! last night in its Atlanta run, as noted previously, and a reasonably good time was had by all. SB noted as "The Song That Goes Like This" ended that, in her own summer-stock days, she had encountered a number or two like that herself (referring to the characters' complaints in the lyric about the technical challenges and excessive length of the song).

We spent the evening thereafter multi-tasking: running her up to her office for some quick printouts of work she had to finish, watching the new Battlestar Galactica ep (labor problems in the fleet embroil Chief Tyrol and his family, and Baltar becomes a best-selling author; for those who haven't watched it yet, no spoilers here), baking red velvet cupcakes for her singing class tonight, and sorting old bills to clear out the shreddable ones. In all this, we missed the entirety of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences' 79th annual awards show, not caring much...and thereby missed the shockers of the evening:

• Alan Arkin beating out Eddie "How Many Characters Can I Play In One Movie Under Tons of Makeup?" Murphy for Best Supporting Actor as the cocaine-addicted, vulgar-but-doting grandpa in Little Miss Sunshine. (Our local paper's film critic speculates that either voters were put off by the vulgarity of Murphy's more recent film Norbit, which had the bad timing to be released just as ballots were being cast, or that rumors of the former Saturday Night Live star simply having pissed off too many people in Hollywood over the years may now be confirmed.)
    
  
• The Queen and Little Miss Sunshine (of which we have only seen the latter) getting pushed aside for Best Picture by The Departed, in the Academy's collective orgy of guilt over having made its director, Martin Scorsese, the Susan Lucci of the Oscars in previous years. That the man who gave the world Raging Bull, Mean Streets, GoodFellas and Taxi Driver fergossakes, should have been nominated for Best Director no less than five times and lost each time was considered by many in and out of "the biz" a scandal to the jaybirds. Thus last night's Oscarcast turned into a Scorsese lovefest, if for no other reason than the Academy voters' full knowledge that, had Mr. S. gone away statueless yet another time, they might well have returned home from their after-parties to find lynch mobs of film buffs and critics awaiting them in their front yards with torches blazing and pitchforks waving.
  
  Given his previous won/lost record, Mr. S. can be forgiven for not quite believing he'd really, truly won at long, long last; on reaching the podium (after the five-minute standing ovation quieted down), the first words out of his mouth were "Could someone double-check the envelope?" And to all those nit-pickers who whined that The Departed wasn't even Marty's best work, it was demonstrated that even a below-par Scorsese film is still miles above what most of the hacks currently posing as auteurs in Hollywood can put out on their best days (yes, M. Night Shyamalan, I'm looking at you).
  

And among the outcomes that surprised absolutely no one who's paid any attention whatsoever:

• Jennifer Hudson taking home the Best Supporting Actress gold for her bravura performance in Dreamgirls, the movie based on the long-defunct Broadway musical of the same name. (Is it too much to hope for that my favorite musical, Les Miserables, might finally make it to the big screen one of these days Real Soon Now, as has been promised for, what, a decade and a half now? Christ, even Evita finally got a movie!)
    
  
• Helen Mirren winning Best Actress for her limning of staid, stoic Elizabeth II in The Queen. Ms. Mirren had the class and grace to include Her Maj in her acceptance-speech thanks list, though not without an affectionate dig at the royal sense of style [or lack thereof]: "For 50 years and more, Elizabeth Windsor has maintained her dignity, her sense of duty and her hairstyle."
    
  
• Forest Whitaker's intense portrayal of another, far less loved real-life head of state, the late former Ugandan strongman Idi Amin Dada, in The Last King of Scotland copping Best Actor honors. Not bad for a guy whose biggest credits up to now were playing sidekick to Robin Williams in Good Morning, Vietnam and hosting UPN's failed revival of The Twilight Zone.

Congratulations to all and sundry.

So...did you watch? If so, did you play The Oscars Drinking Game? Did you deliberately avoid watching and do something else? Either way, what was the most exciting part of your Oscar night?

Comments

[shelleybear.livejournal.com]

Nope, I didn't watch.
Made one trip to check out "Placebo Cam" (my term for "Thank You Cam") because I wanted to see if it was as stupid and useless as I thought it would be.
It did not disappoint.
Instead I watched "Hannah and Her Sisters".


shelleybear

[jonbaker.livejournal.com]

Debbie thought it wasn't right for Jennifer Hudson not to mention "American Idol" in her acceptance speech. Without AmId, she'd still be back in that church choir.

Jennifer Hudson

[sffilk.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry, oh thatcrazycajun, but if Jennifer Hudson won the Oscar for best supporting, I think something was wrong. Having seen "Dreamgirls," both on Broadway with Jennifer Holliday and on the screen with Jennifer Hudson, I can say, without equivocation, that Jennifer Hudson cannot hold a candle musically to Jennifer Holiday. Jennifer Hudson SANG "And I Am Telling You, I'm Not Going," but Jennifer Holliday took it, molded it, and made it her own when she did it back in 1981-3. The song will always be Jennifer Holliday's and hers alone.

That being said, I just found out that "Dreamgirls" the musical will be in Atlanta in July, with Ms. Jennifer Holliday performing as Effie, and I will be getting my ticket as soon as I know the box office for the show is open.

Re: Jennifer Hudson

[thatcrazycajun.livejournal.com]

Not having seen the film in question or the musical on which it is based, I am not prepared to argue the point with you. But having heard Ms. Holliday's rendition of The Big Song by itself a number of times, I will concede it is hard to imagine finding anyone to equal her in the role (though most of what I've read from the critics seems to indicate that they felt Hudson came close).