S**g You!
Friday, February 4, 2011 at 5:47PM Jose here. Remember how last year the Academy got rid of the Best Original Song performances and in the process denied us the chance to drool at Marion Cotillard's sexy striptease and, eventual winner, Ryan Bingham's dreamy, country sensitivity?
Well, this year they won't deny us the pleasure of making fun of the corny staging for the song contenders (though they dared to deny us the presence of Cher!) and they've brought back the performances in an all-star lineup set to include Oscar winners Randy Newman and Gwyneth Paltrow.
Newman will perform "We Belong Together" (sadly not the epic Mariah ballad) from Toy Story 3, while Paltrow will sing "Coming Home" from Country Strong. Gwyn has a big month ahead and is also set to perform at the Grammys this weekend where she will duet with Cee-lo Green and, wait for this, The Muppets... The music academy is probably terrified Cee-lo and G.Pa will let out one of the infamous expletives in "Fuck You" and are using the Muppets as some sort of insurance. But in a time when Lady Gaga wears Kermit for cocktails isn't it safe to say that no puppets are sacred?
Joining Gwyn and Randy will be Mandy Moore and Alan Menken who will perform "I See the Light" from Tangled and Oscar winner A.R. Rahman and Florence Welch, filling in for Dido, to sing "If I Rise" from 127 Hours.
If there's someone who can bring some life into that tepid song it has got to be Florence (at least her gown is sure to be a sight to behold)
Also, now that I think about it, we have Newman, Rahman, Gwyn and Menken. So, wait, is this the first time an all Oscar winning lineup of performers will do the nominated songs? I'm sure there's a random Oscar statistic here waiting to happen. Can anyone think of another year when that happened?
Gwyneth Paltrow, Original Song, Oscars (10), composers
Reader Comments (12)
oooh, now i'm totally curious about that statistic. makes you wonder. but seems like a hard one to resaearch. Any Oscar musicologists out there?
I'm so happy!! If only Cher was nominated...
And I agrees that the Mariah ballad is epic.
Boy I wish to hear Mariah's ballad performed live again. I heard it on the radio recently and couldn't stop singing to it. I made a fool of myself at the cafe singing it too lol.
Am I the only one pissed they had to pick this of all years to bring back live performances?
Ripley-they only took one year off with the perfs. I think they should have the performances every year. It's a mandatory part of the Oscars (and keeps them nominating good songs).
How God Awful would it be to hear a Randy Newman cover of Mariah?!?
It's Menken, not (the dreamy) Zachary Levi singing with Ms. Moore for Tangled? Booo.
Take that, Adam Shankman!
yeah, i'm with berightback, Levi's vocals were sooo dreamy. Why the heck isn't he performing?!? but i hope that I See The Light wins though. I swooned like crazy during that whole sequence.
i wished Come What May from Moulin Rouge had been nominated during its year. I would've loved to see that duet,...but i don't think that Nicole would've done it anyways.
I read on mtv.com that Levi and Moore are performing and Menken is accompanying on piano.
Florence replacing Dido? That sounds like a disaster. Dido has a light airy voice that matches the hippie dippie New Age vibe of the song. Florence is a wild belty growler who will rip the flimsy structure of the song to the ground and leave America questioning how it won Best Song. That's my prediction and I'm sticking to it (even though I want Randy Newman to win for his perfect little doo-wop number that lets the audience know exactly what to expect from the rest of the film).
So, was Lily Allen or another weak-voiced British pop star not available for the ceremony? What an odd choice. Shoot, having Goop sing the vocal would be a better fit. Or they could invite Catherine O'Hara onstage to show off that beautiful soprano again. Any Oscar ceremony is improved by O'Hara singing live.
Yeah, the Florence decision is all wrong. I mean, with Florence singing people might actually get the impression that "If I Rise" is a good song. At least if it were Dido singing nobody would be able to make that mistake! Although, perhaps it was strategic of the Academy producers since, let's face it, nobody would make it out of "If I Rise" conscious.
I'm excited to see Gwynnie perform and if there was an Oscar god (which, let's face it, there isn't) "Coming Home" would win. The other three songs are such snoozes.
Better yet, scrap all the performances and just bring the music branch out of stage for a televised throttling. Cher can throw the first punch. It'd be a helluva lot more entertaining than watching Randy Newman croon during a performance so sleepy it probably wears slippers.