Illustration by Zach Trenholm
The Big Night
The people cry out to the Academy gods:
More cleavage and glitz! Less Crystal!
oh memories of Oscar of yore! In my wretched youth in the provincial 1950s,
Academy Awards night was my second favorite pagan high holy day -- after
Halloween, when I could indulge in cinematic drag.
Perhaps nothing will ever match my electric ecstasy on the night in 1960 when Elizabeth Taylor, still weak from her emergency tracheotomy at a London hospital, won the Oscar for her role as a sultry call girl in "Butterfield 8." The next day at school, my feet scarcely touched the ground. Still, year after year, I tune into the Academy Awards and hope for nirvana. Nowadays, of course, we have our familiar preceptress, Barbara Walters, to guide us into the evening with her annual pre-Oscar (or post-, depending on your time zone) special. Tonight, clad in a white hostess gown, she greets us in a peculiar, stagy posture that is half Loretta Young, half Ann-Margret, with just a touch of Gypsy Rose Lee. Though I nearly pass out when Barbara confides that theater owners have dubbed boring, horse-faced Harrison Ford "the star of the century," I'm mollified when she labels him "a poor schnook" as a child. Her other guests have more pizzazz: cross-legged Woody Harrelson, looking like the Rasputin Mahesh Yogi, gravely endorses "recycling sperm," while hawk-eyed Lauren Bacall imperiously oversees salmon-slicing at Zabar's deli. At last the Oscars begin, and I go into my usual frenzy of fury at the short shrift given to the stars' limousine-and-red-carpet arrival -- a traditional, sacred ritual for which Angelenos begin lining up at dawn. Why the hell does the Academy think a billion people tune in around the globe? This year the grand entrances are even more amateurishly treated than usual -- a vile, clichéd "Entertainment Tonight" montage of jittery, ugly, cramped shots of a handful of ill-chosen celebrities. But of course the idiotic producers of this show want to reserve all possible time for Billy Crystal, the Host Who Ate Tokyo. Why in Dietrich's name must we tolerate these endless shenanigans by smug, corny hosts? -- at the expense of the stars who are the true raison d'être of the evening. I and every drag queen from Rome to Rio want to see gowns, gowns and glamour! What's the point of designers and jewelers lavishing all that luxury on nominees if we can't see the bloody stuff in all its glory? After Crystal's fully 15 minutes of narcissistic shtick, it's outrageous that the actual award winners like Cuba Gooding Jr. are rushed off the stage by the fascist orchestra, which goes into Juan Peron mode after the requisite 30 seconds. I cheer when Gooding refuses to leave the mike and dances around, shouting and carrying on in rebellion. My anti-Crystal mood lifts somewhat when he lobs a juicy shot at Gloria Steinem and provokes a welcoming wave of applause for Larry Flynt in the audience. Despite the usual humanitarian sentimentality of the Academy establishment (e.g., a droning, senescent Arthur Hiller), the pornographers seem to be winning. Fashion standouts are the royally composed and chiseled-cheek-boned Kristin Scott Thomas; Nicole Kidman, svelte in elegant Chinese puce; Sigourney Weaver, stiletto-slim in wine-red; and Lauren Holley, whose pert bosom juts on display in a very forward manner. Barbara Hershey, who has gone through more bizarre life changes than Jane Fonda, has forever forsworn her flower-child roots by appearing in tumbling Victorian ringlets and a lush, parrot-green gown that encroaches into the aisle and threatens to swallow a very prim Jodie Foster in the next row. Nervously clutching the hand of her moist boy toy, Hershey makes the solitary Foster look more sexless than usual. This year, the show is experimenting with sending out single presenters, which does eliminate the usual asinine interplay of tittering duos stumbling over names longer than Anglo-Saxon monosyllables, but which cruelly exposes a whole series of unprepared girly-girls -- Mira Sorvino, Sandra Bullock, the mealy-mouthed Winona Ryder -- to more sacrificial pressure than they deserve. What is this -- Iphigenia at Aulis? Introducing Madonna, Crystal takes a swipe at a squirming Barbra Streisand by praising Madonna's "class" for performing, despite not being nominated herself. Class, maybe; hara-kiri most definitely. Why did Madonna think she could carry off a quiet torch song live? Frowning and straining with deadly earnest and awkwardly waving an errant left arm, she breathlessly quavers off-key and manages to cast renewed doubt on her singing abilities. When a relaxed, radiant Celine Dion comes on to pinch-hit for the next song, it's an unexpected relief. Presenter Courtney Love, following Madonna's shaky screw-up, looks like the cat that swallowed the canary. Quel oneupsmanship! -- as Holly Golightly might say. More statuesque than Madonna, Love looks chic and confident in silky white. I'm no fan of Hole, which I think overrated, but Love has sang-froid and real dignity onstage -- in the way the slouching, servile Winona Ryder or klutzy, tatty Claire Danes do not. Whoops! Lauren Bacall, against every prediction, doesn't win the Oscar for best supporting actress. Bacall looks like she's going to cry. I am devastated and rush downstairs to get a beer. This past weekend, AMC was showing one of my favorite Bacall films, "Young Man with a Horn," so I'm taking this very hard. She's in my pantheon of major divas. A very stylish, sexy someone named Jessica Yu, accepting the Oscar for documentary short subject, is looking absolutely fabulous and upstaging most of the show's official stars. She even gets off one of the best lines: "You know you've entered new territory when your dress costs more than your film!" Mazel tov to Ms. Yu, and here's hoping we see more of her! Despite being done to death on recent, hectoring PBS fund appeals, Michael Flatley (formerly of "Riverdance") and his "Lord of the Dance" troupe storm onstage in a fiery burst of genuine creative energy. The red and black leather costumes are a bit Pat Benatar (I love her; don't get me wrong), but all this sweaty physicality feels real good after Billy Crystal's smarmy nattering. Debbie Reynolds, pushing a ship's prow of enormous bosoms, sails to the mike and pronounces her prompter text "drivel." Out comes the sheepish writer -- her depressive nudge of a daughter, Carrie Fisher, hunchbacked and in slacks. How remarkable that the postmenopausal mother seems more female and more vital -- the vampire lives! Bounding onstage are the three indomitable stars of "The First Wives Club": Bette Midler, Goldie Hawn and Diane Keaton, bubbling over with infectious glee. What fun! Their chemistry is so obvious that Hollywood has to be crazy not to plan a sequel. Jodie Foster strides purposefully out to give the screenplay awards. She looks better standing up, her silver lamé pants swishily glittering under a white tunic. But then she opens her mouth, and out comes that horrible, pinched, snide, nasal accent -- Candace Bergen Goes to Yale on a Feminist Visa. The evening is wearing down. I'm glad that Frances McDormand -- an honest, spunky Carol Burnett type -- wins for best actress, but I'm peeved that Geoffrey Rush gets best actor for mimicking a real-life person with a disability -- Hollywood p.c. with a vengeance. At least Ralph Fiennes didn't get it, thank heavens -- what an awful, obvious actor. Only in a Harrison Ford age could anyone think the uptight, antiseptic Fiennes sexy. Bring back Kirk Douglas! -- a dreamboat in his prime.
Well, I'm off. Can't wait till next year!
What did you think of the Big Night? Speak up in Table Talk.
The tyranny of racial categories (03/18/97) How do you handle a hungry man? (03/04/97) Why does female homosexuality turn me on? (02/18/97) Politically incorrect desires (02/04/97) Should I support Paula Jones? (01/27/97) Bookmark: http://www.salonmagazine.com/columnists/paglia.html |
