Emmys: We’re bored to death by the Limited Series

by Cláudio Alves

With 16 overall nominations, BEEF’s second season is our likely frontrunner. But who cares?

It’s over, finished. The TV Academy has broken us – Eric, Nathaniel and I – with the dullest Limited or Anthology Series race in eons. Make that races, for even the acting categories leave something to be desired, with rampant category fraud and some egregious snubs. How did Jamie Bell miss out for Half Man? How in hell did every one of Beef’s leads get a nod except the season’s MVP? And did Jason Bateman really need to double dip with Black Rabbit and DTF St. Louis? Not even Oscar Isaac’s hotness or the possibility of a history-making victory for Matthew Rhys are enough to energize this sorry lot.

Apologies for the grumpiness, but here we go…

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Showbiz History: Love Story wins, Captain America begins, United Artists formed

8 random things that happened on this day, February 5th, in showbiz history

1919 United Artists is formed with four of the most iconic silent film powerhouses Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, and Director DW Griffith joining forces...

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Vintage '70 - Marinate in it!

The Supporting Actress Smackdown 1970 Edition arrives in three weeks (we've moved the date to May 13th) so as we approach and you vote (hint hint), let's talk context in movies and entertainment... 

Great Big Box Office Hits: When it comes to box office, there are a lot of competing sources about what films were massive hits prior to the internet era when tracking success became such a cultural activity. But all sources basically agree that there were five true behemoths at the movies in 1970. The top four were the tearjerker Love Story, the all-star disaster flick Airport, the Altman comedy MASH, and the war drama Patton (remarkably they made up 80% of the Best Picture list... though prior to the 1980s it's always worth reiterating that the public had much more Oscary taste in their movies -- it was public taste that changed, not really the Oscar aesthetic... contrary to much of the grousing you here online about Oscar shunning hits and preferring underseen critical darlings). The fifth consensus smash hit was the Dustin Hoffman Christmas release Little Big Man which scored only 1 nomination from the Academy for Chief Dan George in Supporting Actor; he was the first Native American to score an Oscar nomination in any category!

Chief Dan George in "Little Big Man"Beyond that quintet the details about which films were big hits gets fuzzier though various sources also list some, though never all, of these movies:  Ryan's Daughter, Tora! Tora! Tora!, Chariots of the Gods, The Aristocrats, Joe, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, the documentary Woodstock, and the musical On a Clear Day You Can See Forever.

Oscar's Best Picture Nominees: Airport (10 noms / 1 win), Five Easy Pieces (4 nominations),  Love Story (7 noms / 1 win), MASH (5 noms / 1 win), and Patton (10 noms / 7 wins). Our theory as to what was just outside the Best Picture shortlist plus more '70 goodies follow...

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Arthur Hiller (1923-2016) and "Making Love"

Arthur Hiller with his Jean Hersholt Huminatarian AwardOscar nominated Canadian born Hollywood director Arthur Hiller died yesterday at 92 years of age. Though he's best remembered for the 1970 mega-hit Love Story  -- so popular in its day it would have been equivalent to a Jurassic World at the box office today (no really) -- his career was actually quite varied. He did dramas, romances, buddy comedies, period pieces, you name it.

Among his best known films which is your favorite?

• The Americanization of Emily (1964)
• The Out of Towners (1970)
• Love Story (1970)
• Plaza Suite (1971)
• Man of La Mancha (1972)
• Silver Streak (1976)
• The In-Laws (1979)
• Making Love (1982)
• Author! Author! (1982)
• Outrageous Fortune (1987)
• See No Evil, Hear No Evil (1989) 

Outrageous Fortune was probably my favorite of his films - Bette Midler & Shelley Long were so funny together --  but the film that's the most interesting, historically, is Making Love as it was the very first mainstream LGBT film...

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Beauty Break: Ryan O'Neal

Baby Tatum and dad RyanToday is the 75th birthday of early 70s cinema's golden boy Ryan O'Neal. Happy Birthday Father o' Tatum. The picture to the left is just the cutest thing ever, don't you think? If not you don't cherish and worship and love to revisit Paper Moon (1973) in which the real life father & daughter stars played a fictional father and daughter, and played it to perfection in one of the greatest movies of that enormously fine cinematic decade.

But today, perhaps, younger readers don't really know Ryan O'Neal. In today's celebrity parlance I would suggest that he's something like a cross between Ryan Phillipe (all-american golden boy, super young dad as celebrity parenting goes, who remains more famous for his personal life than his career) and Leonardo DiCaprio (I shall explain). After coming to fame on television's Peyton Place (1964-1969) O'Neal was Oscar nominated for the #1 box office behemoth Love Story (1970) which we presume was something like the Titanic of its day. A bold statement you say? Perhaps not so bold...

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