Posted on 02/25/2012 2:59:30 PM PST by OddLane
Jack Haley, Jr. hit upon a brilliant idea. The producer of the 1979 Oscars telecast devised a special medley of hit songs the Academy never nominated. Steve Lawrence and Sammy Davis, Jr. would perform it at the ceremony. The Academy’s Music Branch protested, but when Haley and host Johnny Carson threatened to walk they relented.
A smash hit, the audience applauded “Oscar’s Only Human” throughout and treated the performers to a prolonged ovation.
****
Oscar is only human, and he’s made some terrible mistakes over the years. From controversial wins to unfortunate slights to sins of showmanship, the Academy Awards have failed time and time again.
In honor of this Sunday’s broadcast, here are my personal picks for Oscar’s ten most egregious screw-ups:
(Excerpt) Read more at pjmedia.com ...
Thanks, thanks, thanks for posting this! (Do I sound like an Oscar recipient?)
Everyone, go to the link and watch Steve Lawrence and Sammy Davis’ routine, it’s great!
They are two of my all time faves, OddLane you really made my day with this thread! (I saw Steve & Edie in Las Vegas, still sooooo happy I did that!)
And the story is good too, I remember the Snow White debacle, it seems they didn’t get permission from Disney, I think that is pretty well a Cardinal Sin in Hollywood, and it was really bad too!
What a great post, I’ll be playing that vid for hubby tomorrow before the show.
Once again this year we’ve seen NONE of the movies!
:)
“Everything about Forest Gump was wretched.”
Well, wretched is a strong word, but I know what you mean.
I never saw this movie until a long time later on TV, but it was just awful. It was like a series of short sketches tacked together, I couldn’t believe how much people liked it, nor that it had won best picture!
Another one was “Sideways”, that was an OK movie (much better than Forrest Gump), but best picture, really? A couple of good performances, yes, but...best picture? I don’t think so.
Personally, I think Forrest Gump is a great movie-although I disliked some of the changes the director made to Winston Groom's novel-even if artistically it's not on par with Citizen Kane.
It was in the article already.
10. Makin’ Whoopi… Into An Oscar Winner
All you had to know about The Academy was when The Passion wasn’t nominated for Best Picture..it’s one of the greatest works of art the past 20 years.
I had a bit of an issue with the writer about Forrest Gump. 1994 had a lot of good movies for some reason and even thought the other two cited were great, only one could win. I would guess if Pulp won, the writer would belly ache that Gump didn’t win.
That movie was a piece of crap. I couldn’t understand all the hype either after watching it. It reminded me of some grind house or drive in double feature from the 70’s.
One of the markers I have for a good movie is whether or not it's entertaining, i.e. will I watch it more than once.
I'm not going to claim that Forrest Gump is a cinematic masterpiece, but it's one of the few movies that's broadcast incessantly that I can sit through after x number of viewings.
I agree. I liked Gump. I remember some dude at work trying to tell me about this movie and I didn’t understand what he was talking about so I went to the theater just to find out. I enjoyed it.
While most movies produced are horribly distasteful, with 375 channels of gay smutty kinky wasteland on TaaVaaa, as they the viewers to pay to watch their commercials, depicting white men as bloated shiftless pigs or incompetent skinny wimps working at chicken licken...While the politicians sit in balcony's watching the country circle the drain, wasting time, waiting for their next TaaVaa interview.
It's just amazing.
I have a similar barometer. I know that one of the supposed "outrages" of Oscar history is that How Green Was My Valley beat Citizen Kane. I have never, actually, seen Citizen Kane; but, I love How Green was my Valley. That is a movie that I will watch whenever it is on. (I believe the show Frasier did an episode about how the movie HGWMV was his favorite movie and he was trying to find a copy of it to watch. Hilarity insues.
Last night I saw Secretariat was on, again, and so I watched it, again. I just like that movie. Ditto, While You Were Sleeping. Not the greatest movies in the world, but I just enjoy myself when I watch them.
As for this particular Oscar year, I really would have liked to see somebody be bold and nominate Andy Serkis for Best Supporting Actor for his role as Cesar in Rise of the Planet of the Apes. His performance was incrediably nuanced. Also, (hello) Alan Rickman as Snape in Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows Pt. II? A terrific performance.
Actually, it was Shakespeare In Love and it was SO UNDESERVING against Saving Private Ryan - it was a DISGRACE ...
I've been in combat and the first 15 minutes [Omaha Beach] scared the shit out of me. For its realism and how it showed what the Greatest Generation did at that landing - how could it NOT have won?
Because the members of the Academy considers themselves as Artistes - and Shakespeare is the altar upon which they worship ...
I agree with you, even though I've never served.
Say what you will about Steven Spielberg, that opening scene is one of the most amazing things I've ever seen in cinema.
Rent Citizen Kane - it is VERY good. I've seen both films - I'd rate them about the same. Never did see the GREATNESS everybody attributes to Kane as the best picture of all time. It's technical stuff [photography, etc.] is AMAZING, though ...
That's number one.
Not my favorite sports film by any stretch of the imagination, but really enjoyable.
You are not alone. I thought the bottom picture was Shirley Jones until I saw the date.
I’m just really surprised to find out that “Shakespere in Love” and “Saving Private Ryan” are from the same year.
I’m like really confused right now.
FWIW I saw SIL, it was a cute movie, not best picture standard by any means (see my comment about “sideways” above).
But look at last year (or the year before) when “The Hurt Locker” won and also when “Juno” won.
Now, I didn’t see “The Hurt Locker” (was that best picture? I think so)or “Saving Private Ryan” I really don’t like war movies and I don’t think “Juno” won best picture.
But I think these were 2 movies that expressed some very conservative values (definitely Juno did, excellent movie, totally pro-life) and won major awards. To the astonishment of many if not most in the audience.
So, all hope is NOT LOST, that is my point.
I’m going back and watching Steve & Sammy again.
Yes I am.
The only rap I have against Saving Private Ryan is that it DID NOT include the seminal quote of the day on Omaha Beach - by Colonel George Taylor.
When all of the men were pinned down and NOT going anywhere, Colonel Taylor strode up and down the beach amidst withering fire from the Germans and said:
"There are two kinds of people who are staying on this beach: those who are dead and those who are going to die. Now let’s get the hell out of here."
And, thats EXACTLY what they did ...
BTW: Robert Mitchum played Colonel Taylor and delivered the quote in The Longest Day ...
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