Honorary Oscar too early, O'Toole tells academy

Toronto Star ^ | 1/29/2003 | AP

[JennysCool]

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Peter O'Toole's peers want to reward him with an honorary Academy Award. But the actor, who has been nominated for an Oscar seven times but never won, is not sure he's ready to accept it.

O'Toole, 70, sent a handwritten letter last week to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences saying he was "enchanted" at the thought of an honorary Oscar but that he still had a shot at earning the award for a particular acting performance.

The academy announced last week that it intended to award O'Toole an honorary Oscar for a career that has included best-actor nominations for Lawrence of Arabia, The Lion in Winter, Goodbye Mr. Chips, My Favourite Year and three other film roles.

The actor wrote back that since he was "still in the game, and might yet win (the award) outright, would the academy please defer the honour until I am 80?"

Academy officials said Wednesday they had not received a definite answer from O'Toole on whether the letter meant he would not show up to collect the award at the Oscar ceremony March 23. An O'Toole spokeswoman contacted by telephone Wednesday declined to comment.

The story first appeared in the trade paper Daily Variety.

In his letter, O'Toole said he learned of the honorary Oscar from his agent, who had talked informally with the Academy board.

"We don't negotiate and it's not contingent upon anyone appearing," Academy President Frank Pierson told Variety.

The statue will be waiting for O'Toole whenever he is ready to accept it, Pierson said.

The academy's board "unanimously and enthusiastically voted you the honorary award because you've earned it and deserved it," Pierson said in a response to O'Toole.

"It will be there for you at the awards ceremony March 23, and we hope you'll be there with us. If not, it will be at the academy for you to pick up when you're 80, or whenever you're ready," he said.

[JennysCool]

O'Toole wants to win it by working. I think that's refreshing.

[Argus]

I cracked up when I read this today. "Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated."

[JennysCool]

"would the academy please defer the honour until I am 80?"

The guy's got both class and a sense of humor, I'm thinking.

[LS]

How did this guy NOT win it for "Lawrence of Arabia?" Who won it that year?

[JennysCool]

Gregory Peck, To Kill a Mockingbird ... Well-deserved!

[TheConservator]

Two great acting performances in one year! You won't see that today. The movie industry has sure gone to hell in a handbasket.

(I saw Gangs of New York recently. A terribly violent movie. But I did think Daniel Day-Lewis did a superb acting job as Bill the Butcher.)

[Tax-chick]

Good for him! "Lawrence of Arabia" and "The Lion in Winter" are my two favorite movies, ever.

If Peter O'Toole is still breathing, he can win an Oscar for a current role.

Maybe he's a fruitbat like most of them, I dunno, but damn, he makes great movies!

[Inspectorette]

I'll never forget him in "My Favorite Year" - a comedy about '50's TV. He was brilliant - hilarious, but poignant as well, especially in the scenes where he's surreptiously checking on his young daughter, who has been estranged from him by his ex-wife.

O'Toole plays a faded, womanizing star. One of the characters, mentions something about his "talent" for pleasing the ladies. To which, O'Toole rebuts, "The activities of my ____ is MY business". The hapless lackey then asks, "So - how's business?" O'Toole, without missing a beat: "Nevah bettah!"

[habs4ever]

This great actor has been robbed and he deserves one NOW.That he was passed over for Lawrence of Arabia for that drip Gregory Peck in Kill a Mockingbird is absurd.Or his riveting role in the Ruling Class and Lion and Winter proved his immense talent.Hollywood never gave an Oscar to James Mason, or Richard Burton, as well.

[wimpycat]

Peter O'Toole is one of my favorites, too, but he sure hasn't aged very well. I think it's because he's Irish; Richard Harris looked like death warmed over, too, for at least a decade before he actually died.

Have you noticed that that former Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, the one who is fluent in Arabic that we see on the news all the time looks almost exactly like Peter O'Toole?

A really fun O'Toole flick is "What's New, Pussycat?" It's really dated and campy, but funny. Tom Jones sings the title song.

[Vinomori]

"What's New Pussycat" is HUGELY underrated...and O'Toole
was fabulous in it....as he was in Becket.....in my own opinion
his greatest performance ever.

[mgstarr]

"Lawrence of Arabia" and "The Lion in Winter" are my two favorite movies, ever.

Don't forget about Becket and a younger Henry II.

[Tax-chick]

I don't know that I've seen a recent film. "Svengali," with a young Jodie Foster (singing!) was cool.

My Grandpop was Irish; he faded early, too. But he could whistle a symphony and charm a bar crowd until the day he died!

[wimpycat]

I saw Becket years and years ago; I need to rent that again.

[Tax-chick]

Gorgeous, but he just didn't do it for me as Henry II. Not Viking enough. The Normans were rednecks, don'tcha know ...

[Inspectorette]

I'll never forget him in "My Favorite Year" - a comedy about '50's TV. He was brilliant - hilarious, but poignant as well, especially in the scenes where he's surreptiously checking on his young daughter, who has been estranged from him by his ex-wife.

O'Toole plays a faded, womanizing star. One of the characters, mentions something about his "talent" for pleasing the ladies. To which, O'Toole rebuts, "The activities of my ____ is MY business". The hapless lackey then asks, "So - how's business?" O'Toole, without missing a beat: "Nevah bettah!"

[wimpycat]

No doubt, no doubt! The Irish are lovely people, but the men sure look weatherbeaten as they get older. And it's probably the whiskey that does it.

[Inspectorette]

Oops - sorry for the double post!

[mgstarr]

Terrific performances by both Burton and O'Toole in Becket - before the influence of too much booze and women set in.

In their prime they could run circles around our current crop of "stars". They actually knew how to act.

[Tax-chick]

I meant the younger Henry II, feeling his oats. He was perfect as the old lion, and Katharine Hepburn was the Eleanor for the ages. If my little Eleanor has her class, I'll consider myself a successful mother!

[mgstarr]

But he was Henry II in Lion in Winter also - just an older version.

[habs4ever]

O'Toole is also a Gauloise chainsmoker, so that may have made his skin resemble tanned oak bark leather ;-)Plus, he has lost half his stomach to surgery, so I bet his insides are a bit feeble.Plus, he drinks, too.

You'd also never know it but he's a real Hitler buff.He regularly goes to Vienna, Wolf's Lair, Munich, Nuremberg,Berlin, just to trace his footsteps.He's got a huge Hitler memorabilia collection and fascination.

[BluH2o]

The actor wrote back that since he was "still in the game, and might yet win (the award) outright, would the academy please defer the honour until I am 80?"

Saw Peter O'Toole in person January 1978 in NYC. He had just finished a network TV interview at WTC 1 (there was a studio on the ground floor) and he and his entourage were walking across the lobby area towards the elevators ... probably going to lunch at Windows of the World. He looked in my direction, and I remember being struck by how tall he was ... well over six feet.

[okie01]

"O'Toole wants to win it by working. I think that's refreshing."

British actors don't "perform". They work! No two years between gigs, no promotional appearances, no celebrity schmoozing. They finish one film, they start another. Or do a stage play.

Check the filmographies for O'Toole, as well as Michael Caine and Sean Connery.

These guys are professionals, not prima donnas.

[Tax-chick]

"Act" is the operative word, huh? Today's young "stars" are just ... there. Maybe they'll learn to act, maybe not.

Funny profession, acting. It's a craft, unquestionably; but sometimes it's just plain luck, too. I think of John Wayne (that is, Marion Morrison) ... lots of luck, but he also worked hard to learn to ACT, to be JOHN WAYNE on the big screen. James Garner, too ... born with the looks and personality, but he learned to act.

I detect a working-class work-ethic theme here ...

[Xthe17th]

and don't forget he was in Klintigula er, I mean Caligula (1980):

There's just nothin' like a movie with heads gettin' chopped off by giant lawnmowers and Malcom McDowell lathering a girl's derriere with lard. Hey, make some popcorn and invite the neighbors and kids!

[wimpycat]

Actually, he hasn't had a drink in decades, at least as recently as a few years ago. I read his autobiography. He says he doesn't mind having the reputation for drinking, but he says he hasn't been drinking for a long time.

[Lancey Howard]

I saw Robert Redford in 'The Last Castle' recently and he looked like he had plastic surgery to make him look like Peter O'Toole.

By the way, let me take this opportunity to recommend one very amazing movie which starred Peter O'Toole: 'Night of the Generals'. One strange movie, and highly recommended.

[Political Junkie Too]

"We don't negotiate and it's not contingent upon anyone appearing," Academy President Frank Pierson told Variety.

You will win when WE say you will win.

-PJ

[Xthe17th]

Oops, bad link. Try this one: Klintigula

[Tax-chick]

Not the same ... I just don't see it. Henry was BRED, Peter was ... bogtrotter. I am, too, so I'm not putting it down, but fitting it with history ...

In Heaven, we'll get to see all the Real Guys, and I look forward to the arguments! "You can't be Henry VIII ... are you kiddding? What did women see in YOU?"

Cy

[habs4ever]

You see Night of the Generals and you'll notice the eye work he had done since.He looks nothing like he used to from the mid-70's on...

[Lancey Howard]

You'd also never know it but he's a real Hitler buff.He regularly goes to Vienna, Wolf's Lair, Munich, Nuremberg,Berlin, just to trace his footsteps.He's got a huge Hitler memorabilia collection and fascination.

Interesting. That sheds some light on his amazing, 'Night of the Generals' performance.

[mgstarr]

I think a lot of who I consider the greats (O'Toole, Burton, Gielgud, Olivier, Harris, etc.) learned their craft on the stage in front of a real audience.

There's also a difference between great acting and having a great presense. It took Wayne most of his career to learn how to act well but his presense was there from the beginning.

As for Garner, some of those early Rockford episodes still rock :-)

[habs4ever]

Funny, he had an interview with Richard Harris in the Telegraph about 3 yrs ago, and they both were enjoying a drink or two at the Savoy....like Harris, i don't think he gave it up, just cut back.

[Tax-chick]

Creepy! Off to the video store ... I have a weaving project that needs to get done, anyway, and there's nothing like looking at Peter O'Toole!

[habs4ever]

He explained it in a South Bank Show interview, where he described his childhood obsession with Hitler.He wanted nothing more than to kill him when he growing up, and fantasized about playing such a hero.He got the chance to act it out in 1976, in Rogue Male, which was another version of a 1941 film with Walter Pidgeon.It was a pretty good TV flick.

[jjhunsecker]

Here at one point you had four of the finest actors of their generation to ever grace a stage or screen, Richard Burton, Peter O'Toole, Richard Harris & Anthony Hopkins. Between them they had umpteen Oscar Nominations and only Hopkins ever won and it was for "Silence of the Lambs". So many great pictures. One poster was right those guys knew how to act and there is not one Amercian actor today, with the exception of Jack Nicholson, who can really act. Oh well we can always watch the great films on TCM or AMC.

[wimpycat]

Maybe you're right; it may have been that he merely stopped his massive intake of alcohol. It's been a few years since I read his autobiography (I like reading the autobiographies of British/British-trained actors; they also write very well...Laurence Olivier, Richard Burton, David Niven...they all write very well) but I seem to remember him talking about quitting drinking because of his stomach problems.

[what's up]

Looks like he's currently working on playing Augustus.

Maybe he's hoping to get the Oscar for that.

[Tax-chick]

In some ways, I think that's the key ... they were HUNGRY! James Garner was a nobody from Oklahoma. I feel like I know him, because (1) We were visiting Norman when he spoke at the OU graduation, (paraphrase) "I'm successful because I worked like a dog, and so can you!" and (2) because our real estate agent in Norman, a Korean War vet, went to high school with James Garner when he was a regular redneck kid ... just prettier than most.

Work! "You may be whatever you resolve to be!"

Sean Connery, Michael Caine, "The Man Who Would Be King" ... words fail me!

[habs4ever]

Niven's writing was a scream.i think he was the life of every party, really well liked adn affable and also a right winger, too.He was a very good friend of Bill Buckley's, much like Roger Moore now.

I loved how Niven described how he and George Sanders purposely caught Zza Zza Gabor in flagrante one night.I don't know how they couldn't stop laughing!

[Tax-chick]

Octavian Augustus Caesar? In his extremely old age, one would hope!

When, where, what channel?!

[my_pointy_head_is_sharp]

Murphy's War

[Spyder]

That's the *only* X-rated (or "not rated") film my husband and I ever saw in a theater... We went to Georgetown to see it (about an hour and a half from home at the time). I like Malcolm McDowall and O'Toole, but that was one raw, raw movie - I would tend to agree with the review you posted.

We did try one other one at a drive-in once (The 9 Lives of Fritz the Cat) and drove out after less than 10 minutes.

[eleni121]

He was absolutely riveting as Lawrence. Who can forget Omar Sharif and Peter O'Toole in the sands of Arabia...

[VermiciousKnid]

The Lion In Winter is one of my favorite movies. O'Toole was brilliant in it, and it is quite possibly the best-written film ever made. What dialogue!

O'Toole deserves his honorary Oscar, but I like his spunk in saying he's got more time to get one the conventional way.

Regards,

[mgstarr]

" I found out the way your mind works and the kind of man you are. I know your plans and expectations--you've burbled every bit of strategy you've got. I know exactly what you will do, and exactly what you won't, and I've told you exactly nothing. To these aged eyes, boy, that's what winning looks like! " Peter O'Toole as Henry

" I made Louis take me on Crusade. I dressed my maids as Amazons and rode bare-breasted halfway to Damascus. Louis had a seizure and I damn near died of windburn... but the troops were dazzled. " Katherine Hepburn as Eleanor

More fun quotes at http://yoursay.imdb.com/Quotes?0063227

[beaversmom]

O'Toole is one of my favorites as well. I agree with you that he hasn't aged well--probably the boozing and smoking didn't help. He was so handsome during the Lawrence period.

[beaversmom]

I hope O'Toole still has some high quality work to come. I think he deserves an honorary Oscar because he has deserved an Oscar for so many of his films. I do have to say though, he has starred in some films not worthy of his acting ability. Anyway, I hope he shows up--I'd love to see him. Even with all his flaws, he is a class act.