Podcast: Spread the Wealth, End the War

I couldn't let the postmortem on Oscar's 84th close without inviting my ol' podcast pals Katey, Nick and Joe to join me for one last conversation of the season. We ended up talking for over an hour. See we all share this "can't stop talking Oscar!" addiction and none of us will ever go to rehab. So you get the podcast in two parts. Part two late tonight.

Here's part one where we start goofy with Octavia Spencer's ubiquity and end all serious like (well, mostly) with Viola and Meryl. Join the conversation in the comments.

Topics include but are not limited to...

• Octavia Spencer, Angelina Jolie
• "Cut To Camera 3. No, Camera 4. Wait, Back to 2!"
• Spreading the Wealth. What Did They Actually Love?
• Billy Crystal's 9th Go-Round
• Emma Stone vs. Anne Hathaway with a side of Jonah Hill
• Red Carpet Reveals and Lead Actor Presentations
• CLIPS! Commercial Breaks
• Meryl & Viola and the Narrative vs. Performance Problem

You can download the podcast on iTunes or listen right here at the bottom of the post.
UPDATE: PART TWO NOW AVAILABLE AS WELL.

Post Oscar Part One

Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer on Black Artists and Image.

I know I've gone on and on about Viola Davis this year. It's no secret that I'm rooting for her in Best Actress. She's such an enormous talent and such an interesting woman and she keeps on reminding me of of both of those truths in different revealing ways this year. (I'm really going to be disheartened if The Help doesn't lead to better and bigger things. I don't want to see her play one more lame anyone could do this "best friend to the heroine" part like in Eat Pray Love.) Thanks to Mark Harris for pointing out this new interview from the Tavis Smiley show on PBS and thanks to Tavis Smiley for starting with the rough stuff. He basically begins by telling the actresses that though he is rooting for them he is uncomfortable about awarding black women for playing maids some 73 years after Hattie McDaniel's Gone With the Wind win and he was also uncomfortable with Denzel Washington's win a decade ago for playing a dirty cop in Training Day. The stars and the host really get into it (respectfully). Here's Viola's take.

That mindset... is absolutely destroying the black artist. The black artist cannot live in a revisionist place. The black artist can only tell the truth about humanity. Humanity is messy. People are messy. Caucasian actors know that. They understand that. They understand that when you bring a human being to life you show all the flaws as well as the beauty. We, as African American artists, are more concerned with image and message and not execution. Which is why every time you see our images they've been watered down to a point where they are not realistic at all. It's like all of our humanity has been washed out. We as artists cannot be politicians. We as artists can only be truth tellers.

The conversation blossoms from there. They talk August Wilson. They talk Fences. They talk Red Tails. They talk about acting as baton passing. It's great stuff and nobody pulls any punches.

Octavia's late interview response about the difficulty of convincing Hollywood to bankroll more black projects takes a nice turn, too.

Let me tell you the other thing. It begins with the ticket buyer. Dee Rees wrote an amazing film called Pariah. And if you haven't paid to see it at a theater near you, you're part of the problem.

It's inspiring that some people, and people as visible as Meryl Streep and these two, have singled out Pariah for praise. It's just too bad the movie had such extremely limited distribution and too bad it was saved until the one weekend of the year when no one would be able to pay it any attention during the Oscar glut. But bygones. It's one of my favorite pictures of last year and I'm hoping it gets a better life on DVD.

The complete interview which I've embedded after the jump is well worth a watch if you have half an hour. 

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"Dream Big, Dream Fierce" This Oscar Season

The SAG Awards are receding in the review mirror, but the afterglow remains. How much power can emotional narratives have within our seasonal awards journey? Viola Davis has been a major actress for a long time within the showbiz community -- this very website first handed her two gold medals way back in early 2003 for her gobsmackingly great single scene in Antwone Fisher and her breakthrough year of smart character work in Far From Heaven and Solaris -- but it's only in the past few years that the mainstream has begun to learn her name and key in to her potent gift.  There's nothing like a 'who's that?' Oscar nomination (Doubt), A List friendship (Streep) and a big fat juicy hit (The Help) to boost your profile.

So I wasn't surprised but was definitely delighted to see her receive a standing ovation when she walked up to accept Best Actress for The Help.

Perhaps the standing ovation is an annual occurence and I've merely forgotten.

In some ways our relationship with the awards circus is a long one with deep pockets of memories, held grudges and fond crushes. In other ways it's as if we're goldfish swimming round the bowl and we're surprised by that little plastic castle every time.

But I think the true indicator that Viola Davis is the likely winner of the Best Actress Oscar is not the win itself with SAG, which has a much wider more diverse voting body than Oscar, but the crowd response. Reducing co-stars to tears is probably no great achievement. They were in the trenches with you so naturally Jessica Chastain, Octavia Spencer and Cicely Tyson were crying their eyes out. But making Zoe Saldana and Angelina Jolie all misty? Boosting Dick Van Dyke's mood when he was already high on life? 

What is going on here? (More after the jump)

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SAG Live Blog: Bridesmaids, Silent Stars and The Help

6:30 I was writing an (unrelated) short little note about Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy moments ago and am suddenly thrust onto a red carpet with fast talking E! reporters uttering inanities while stars explain who they're wearing. These are things old spies never have to think about. But tonight is not about the spies. It's about bridesmaids, silent film stars, time travelling writers, Hawaiian land barons and maids. The first four things I hear are two engagement stories (good news for Bridesmaids or mere coincidence?), one ode to George Clooney via The Good Wife herself. Then Octavia Spencer --  love that bun (is there are name for those high buns on steroids?) -- announcing that she's robbed Cougar Town of Josh.

Which begs the question: Is anyone in Hollywood not friends with Octavia Spencer?

6:37 Armie Hammer on his wife's bakery. He's not the baker, he's the, uh, taster. The reporter or his wife I can't recall calls this "out of the closet taster?" which he confirms. I'm not making this up. 

I'm an out of the closet taster and Elizabeth is the master baker: lemon pies, tiramisu, many cupcakes. Let's just say we now have the most special red velvet recipe there is. 

For some reason when he's talking about food it sounds utterly filthy. I'm having a flashback to Rock Hudson talking about recipes in that one movie. 

6:40 Rose Byrne is wearing a sparkly jumpsuit and reminding me that she is Australian. I always forget the she's Australian and that jumpsuits exist. The latter by choice.  Although she says Scarface was her inspiration and I can sort of see Michelle Pfeiffer circa 1983 in this look. The BEST part is when she leaves the reporter who is going to commercial and Glenn Close (Damages reunion!) looks her jumpsuit up and down... more than once. She doesn't know what to make of it until...

No, she definitely doesn't like it. Hee.

6:53 Viola Davis is talking about her new daughter. I didn't realize she had adopted. Somewhere I missed that. She sounds happy and nervous and she definitely isn't completely comfortable in her Jimmy Choos. Since we're talking about feet, I feel the need to share this photo.

Regina King tweeted "toes done" an hour ago.

I did not retouch this photo so either her camera phone has some issues or her feet are sunburned. Ouch. Put some aloe vera on that. If feet horrify you I apologize. But, true story, it's how I remembered it was time to live blog.

This live blog is brought to you Regina King's pedicure.

7:02 Jonah Hill says everyone can't believe he was Oscar nominated. To his credit he says that he can't believe it either so he understands.

7:08 Michelle Williams, who clearly does not like talking to reporters about her personal life, does a pretty good job of pretending to be okay with it whilst astrally projecting herself away. I'm reasonably certain she was floating somewhere over Montana whilst Guiliana was inundating her with questions about child rearing.

much more after the jump

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When the Globes Cut To Commercial...

One of my very favorite things about the Golden Globes is the scan of the crowd whenever they're cutting to commercial or returning. You feel like you're in the room, mingling. Or, rather, gawking. You catch little glimpses of conversations ("they know each other?!?"), unofficial screen reunions (Colin & Julianne!), and you end up pondering the sometimes amusing seating arrangements. For instance, Madonna and Meryl Streep, once vocal rivals over Evita (1996), were separated only by Meryl's dutiful husband Don Gummer who never seems to enjoy these things. At one commercial break Madonna was seen gabbing away. He said not a word. 

Here are some of my favorites shots from the evening.

Zooey Deschanel has her thumbs up for Ryan Kwanten. Whatever for? Care to make a guess? I immediately made a false memory that she had actually played Lizzy Caplan's role on True Blood. If you squint they do look kind of alike and imagine what Zooey could do on V.

Laura Linney has either been demoted to the TV section, that outer elevated rim, or she was running about visiting. But she and Charlize obviously like each other. There will  be enthusiastic hugging and kissing.

Viola was extremely eager to get her Moet refilled (wouldn't you be?). Octavia is probably looking off into the distance but it's fun to think that's she's all "slow down girl! You haven't won yet!" 

[sniffle]

three more after the jump including two Marilyns

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