Podcast: Past (first Oscar nights), Present (Oscar aftermath), and Future

Nathaniel welcomes back Nick Davis to talk about making peace with Oscar night such as it was. It's the only Oscar podcast you'll hear that doesn't discuss The Incident! Instead we talk about our first Oscar nights as children as well as what we liked about Sunday's show (yes, there were a few things) and then the conversation drifts towards what's next. What do we hope to see from some of the actors and directors in the future?

You can listen to the podcast on iTunes, Stitcher or Spotify or download the attachment below. 

Oscar Aftermath

William Hurt (1950-2022)

by Nathaniel R

Hurt as I remember him.

I read with total shock yesterday the news that William Hurt had passed away of cancer. There's something about growing up watching famous actors that ties your own ideas about time to their legacy, however loosely. When I heard the news I thought "Noooo he was so young!" before realizing that he was just shy of his 72nd birthday and not the handsome entirely fictional thin-haired 40something actor that I realized I pictured him as, a slightly aged version of his smoldering but callow young beauty, perhaps informed by the wearier sinister bald character actor of his later years. But William Hurt was actually 71 when cancer took him. So why had William Hurt become frozen in time for me? The answer lies not just in my own cinephilia but in the very distinct phases of his career...

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Smackdown '86: Tess, Piper, Mary Elizabeth, Dame Maggie, and Dianne Wiest!

Welcome back to the Supporting Actress Smackdown. Each month we pick an Oscar vintage to explore through the lens of actressing at the edges. This episode takes us back to 1986.  

THE NOMINEES  For the 1986 film year the Academy honored three newbies (Tess Harper, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Dianne Wiest) the latter of whom would become a two-time winner, and welcomed back two veterans (two time winner Maggie Smith and previous nominee Piper Laurie). The characters assembled were a nosy cousin, a savvy girlfriend, a neurotic actress, a spinster chaperone, and an estranged mother.

THE PANELISTS Here to talk about these performances and films with your host Nathaniel are two regular TFE voices Cláudio Alves and Lynn Lee as well as civil rights attorney / cinephile Jonathan Diaz, and writer/cartoonist Rob Kirby.

 SUPPORTING ACTRESS SMACKDOWN + PODCAST  
The companion podcast is embedded in this post and can also be heard at Spotify, Stitcher, iTunes...

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Children of a Linker God

New York Times the miniature model (so edible looking!) of The Grand Budapest Hotel 
Interview talks to Jeff Goldblum - I didn't realize how much I missed him until his scenes in the new Wes Anderson 
/Film Carrie Fisher to be in London for 6 months for the new Star Wars film... Hmmm perhaps more than a cameo, then. But regardless I'm not really looking forward to these after the debacle of the last trilogy
Towleroad on Neil Patrick Harris as a gay icon 

Gawker Rich Juzwiak on the continuation of the gay 300 saga. This line just kills me:

But no one man can satisfy Themistocles. "I have spent my life on my one true love: the Greek fleet," he proclaims. Sounds like an active life!

(I'm never going to see the new 300: Rise of an Empire given the descriptions of how gorey it is -- sounds more vomitous than the first one in this regard! --  but I sure as hell am going to read the hilarious reviews)
The Wire why gay guys love the 300 movies
Cinema Blend Pee Wee Herman's beloved bike auctions for over $36,000. Wait, I thought it wasn't for sale?
Erik Lundegaard if The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1 tops the box office charts in 2014 it'll be the first time that's happened in consecutive years for a sequel since... (you'll never guess when) 
Salon how hotels like the Grand Budapest became relics of the past 

Marlee Matlin, a deaf woman, famously planed a deaf woman in Children of a Lesser God (1986) and won the OscarToday's Most Discussable
Balder & Dash has an impassioned article about why disabled actors should be the only actors cast in disabled roles. The reasoning is very convincing but it does uncomfortably remind me of all of the flak people gave Jared Leto for doing a trans role this year and Leto's very sound response to the criticisms. Just how close do we need or even want actors to be to the roles they play? If we say that a straight man shouldn't ever play a queer role, does that mean queer actors must never play straight roles? And does this mean trans actors who can totally pass as cisgendered people shouldn't be allowed to play cisgendered roles? Does this mean we should never again have a performance like Linda Hunt's great one in The Year of Living Dangerously (1983)? She is not a trans woman or a man, but she played a man convincingly and carried it off beautifully.

It's a fascinating topic and one that I think should be openly discussed even if, in the days of outrage culture, those discussions can be political minefields. My worry is that this sort of stance is just too limiting for artists and boxes them up. On the other hand, though, shouldn't minority artists have first dibs on minority roles? (I know I've been pissed when I've seen bad gay performances in the past and thought "why didn't you just hire a gay?")  Have you ever thought about this and are you also torn between two opinions on the matter?