Oscar Volley: Best Supporting Actress Isn't Supporting Anything

The Oscar Volleys, in which various TFE members discuss specific categories, begin... now

Rossellini & Gomez are two of only four supporting actresses who MIGHT show up in the five-wide Supporting category... if they can get around about seven leading ladies.

BABY CLYDE: The Academy can be a stuffy and old fashioned institution. Adverse to change and reluctant to move with the times, it’s taken decades of pressure to finally get a casting prize added. The poor stunt performers are still without a statue in their honor, so it’s come as a great surprise that a new award has been instituted this year a without any prior announcement or fanfare at all.

They’ve done away with Best Supporting Actress and introduced the ‘Best Lead Actress in a ‘Supporting’ Role’ category. To secure spots for all of those poor unappreciated A List, millionaire, billed above the title, Leading Lady Stars, they’ve been given their very own spill over category. This will ensure the ceremony has as many big names as possible and isn’t encumbered by character actors, theatre performers or anyone over the age of 50 that Tik Tokers won’t recognize...

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Interview: Joan Chen and Zhu Zhu of "Marco Polo"

Reader for more binge-watching? The new Netflix event Marco Polo debuts tomorrow! Here's Jose to talk to its glamorous stars...

The most surprising thing about Netflix's new series Marco Polo may be how much attention it gives to its non-titular female characters. Keep in mind, that the show takes place during the 13th century, an era in which women had little say in politics and were ignored by the history books filled as they are with male explorers and conquistadors, including the title character played by the gorgeous Lorenzo Richelmy. In a show which could have treated its women like decorative supporting objects, series creator John Fusco, the writers, and the actresses make them the most fascinating people we meet. As the boys plan wars, train in kung fu and engage in sword fights of all varieties, the women show their power through intellect.

Two of the best characters in the show are Empress Chabi, played by international film and television goddess Joan Chen (Twin Peaks, Lust Caution), and Princess Kokochin, played by Zhu Zhu. Where the former is serene, to the point where her harshest decisions become chilling, the latter is more explosive. 

Other than its lead (Richelmy), who during the first season is mostly a vessel through which we see the clash of cultures, Marco Polo’s ensemble is completely non-white, something Chen highlighted during our conversation. In a time when Hollywood continues to practice whitewashing in casting, it's refreshing to see a show with people of so many different nationalities and races.

Chen and Zhu Zhu were gracious enough to discuss their process, their inspiration and the importance of history. Our talk is after the jump.

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Oscar Snub? Supporting Actress 1987

Witches of Eastwick 25th anniversary week ends this weekend. I intended to do much more but we'll see what little can be conjured still.

Cherries, Oatmeal, Satan and her weak husband just make her sick!

Film Experience Trivia: Veronica Cartwright was the star of the very first episode of Craig's "Take Three" series right here (well, at the old location) in 2010. He spotlighted her work in three genre pieces (Alien in which she was originally cast as Ripley (!!!) , Invasion of the Body Snatchers and The Witches of Eastwick) concluding that she is the sci-fi-horror scream queen. On Witches:

Cartwright's skill at creating profoundly memorable characters is none more evident than in Witches: you see the very bile rise up in Felicia's face; she vehemently means every word in her religious rants, summoning up as she does some kind of wicked, wrathful acting goddess. With cherry-scented vomit (or even hospital oatmeal) smeared ungainly across her mouth, and spitting hellfire sermons at everyone who'll listen, Cartwright was unafraid to eschew vanity to maintain supporting performance perfection. If the "Alien" lead was stolen away, a Best Supporting Actress nod was more so here. Remote-control fruit-based possession doesn't get any classier than this.

...she exited the film way too soon. 

There were surely people at the time who thought she over reached but when you're the god-fearing counterpart to Jack Nicholson's Devil, you have to go big.

SO, LET'S TALK OSCAR 1987. Here's how the year shook out for Best Supporting Actresses but did you agree with their choices?  

The Oscar List

I saw Moonstruck for the first time in 2 decades last year. My god it holds up. Dukakis, Cher, the screenplay, Nicolas Cage even? All fantastic.

• Norma Aleandro, Gaby: A True Story
• Anne Archer, Fatal Attraction
• Olympia Dukakis, Moonstruck (WINNER)
• Anne Ramsey, Throw Momma From the Train
• Ann Sothern, The Whales of August

The Globe List
the same list but for the following

• Ann Sothern, The Whales of August
• Vanessa Redgrave, Prick Up Your Ears ( also won the prestigious NYFCC Prize)

Vanessa, like Shirley Maclaine, is an oft-nominated Oscar caliber performer who also happens to have a surprisingly large list of snubs (despite the oft-nominated part) suggesting that if they don't love her work in a given year, they don't feel welcoming.

Martha Plimpton in a very unsettling scene in "Shy People". Good movie that's hard to find now.The Indie Spirit List

• Karen Allen, The Glass Menagerie
• Kathy Baker, Street Smart (also won the NSFC Prize)
• Anjelica Huston, The Dead (WINNER)
• Martha Plimpton, Shy People
• Ann Sothern, The Whales of August

I haven't seen Street Smart or The Whales of August but I remember liking the other three performances quite a lot. Sometimes I think I should watch The Dead again as an adult because I'm pretty sure I didn't fully understand it as a teen. I'm always hoping (in vain) that Martha Plimpton's current fame as a dramatic stage star and Emmy nominated comedic lead on Raising Hope will remind people of what a fresh compelling presence she was on the big screen in the 1980s. So talented that one.

The BAFTA List

• Maria Aitken, A Fish Called Wanda
• Anne Archer, Fatal Attraction
• Judi Dench, A Handful of Dust (WINNER, Oscar eligible the following year but wasn't nominated)
• Olympia Dukakis, Moonstruck

Though I've seen all of these films I'll admit to trouble recalling Aitken and Dench's work in those films. But I haven't seen them in 20 years so...

Other Key But Less Kudo'ed Supporting Actresses in 1987

the scene to end all scenes for foot fetishist everywhere. Maggie Han and Joan Chen in THE LAST EMPEROR (1987)

• Veronica Cartwright, The Witches of Eastwick (Saturn Nominee)
• Joan Chen, The Last Emperor
• Paulina Poriskova, Anna
• Margaret Whitton, The Secret of My Succe$s
• Dianne Wiest, The Lost Boys and September 
• Sean Young, No Way Out 

Sean Young's current reputation as a Crazy Person is a bit unfortunate considering that in the '80s (when properly utilized) she was just on fire.

In other retrospective news... I'm never eager to call Oscar "racist" the way so many pundits do. The truth is that they can only choose from what's put in front of them in any given year. Roles for actors of color have never been as juicy nor as abundant as those offered white actors in English language fare and when they get plum opportunities they usually win attention. That said, if there's a "racial" issue with Oscar it's one that doesn't get any attention. For whatever reason, Oscar rarely ever nominates Asian actresses for anything even when they achieve international stardom or headline blockbusters of the arthouse or the multiplex (think Gong Li, Maggie Cheung, Zhang Ziyi, Michelle Yeoh) -- both of which are achievements that get European foreign-language actresses nominated on occasion. They don't even notice Asian actress when they're key players in movies that voters can't otherwise get enough of (Joan Chen right here or Ziyi in Crouching Tiger) I'm not saying Chen should have been nominated -- I haven't seen the movie in way too long -- but wouldn't she have been in other circumstances considering that she plays a drug-addled royal in a Best Picture winner?

WHAT WOULD YOUR NOMINEE LIST LOOK LIKE?
Do you like Cartwright in Witches or do you wish she (and Jack) would tone it down? Which performances do you most wish you'd seen from 1987 that won attention?