A Well Preserved Beauty

This week's New Yorker cover by Barry Blitt

"Ready for His Closeup"

Who cares if Oscar has had work done? He's still a beauty.

I love the cover but Blitt's take, not so much (no surprise but I loathe the smugness people who don't watch the Oscars sometimes have about it... as if watching sports is some kind of civil disobedience. Ha! Sports... very inconoclastic, that. You've really shown society!) but I like Anthony Lane's column. He gets dinged by critics for valuing his wit above the cinema but he's still  a good read.

Oscar night is anxiety central: TV needs the stars to light up the ratings, and the stars, for their part, use TV to stage what is, in essence, a communal bath of self-love. “Just a small group getting together for a pat on the back,” in the words of Janet Gaynor, who won the first Oscar for Best Actress, in 1929. Since then, the pat has become a caress, and the caress has grown into the kind of activity that in “The Wolf of Wall Street” is reserved for yachts and jets.

Are you excited for the big night? I suddenly am after a week of the blahs. After the jump my two favorite New Yorker Oscar covers ever and they're both by the same artist.

Click to read more ...

Curio: Oscar Party Craftiness

Alexa here with the weekly arts and crafts curio.

Listening to Joe, Nick and Nathaniel's discussion of Oscar parties reminded me about all the Oscar games and crafts I've been ambitiously bookmarking over the years.  Maybe it's our overlong Chicago winters, but I seem to get an attack of laziness the week of the show and forgo the crafts in favor of making loads of comfort food.  But really, I want that to change this year, because, how sweet are some of these ideas?  Fun for everyone!  Even the Oscar-averse.  

Probably my favorite is the idea of spray painting Ken dolls Oscar gold.  I love the idea of going all Goldfinger on a thrift store Ken, and getting a posable Oscar statue as a result.

More craft and game ideas after the jump...

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Take My Link Away

Shadow Play Shirley Temple in Fort Apache
Shoshi Games 2014 HA HA. A must for fans of Zosia Mamet on "Girls" and the Winter Olympics
In Contention Karen O to perform "The Moon Song" at the Oscars. So now all the songs will be represented including...
EW IDINA MENZEL doing "Let It Go" so we got our wish
The Wrap Drake is pissed that PSH's death robbed him of his Rolling Stone cover 

Keyframe The fall of Roman Eye Candy in sword and sandal epics
BAFTA last day to vote on the Rising Star award. I chose Lea Seydoux though Lupita Nyong'o was tempting, only because Léa has been great several times already in short succession. Let's hope Lupita gets a fair shot at a big career!
LA Times Gravity dominates the Visual Effects Society awards (as if anything else would have occurred!)
Variety on Disney's very smart hands-off approach to the viral Frozen celebrations happening online
Marvel Comics it's the 50th birthday of the Black Widow today. (Remember how Emily Blunt was going to play her and we were all excited and then it was Scarlett Johansson instead and we were like "ummm..." and then she was terrible in Iron Man 2 but suddenly great in The Avengers. Happy endings!)

Re: This Regurgitated Weekend
Dave Holmes at Vulture wisely (and with great humor) looks back at the box office of 1987 the weekend the original Robocop debuted. I bring this up because this weekend's wide releases are ALL THREE OF THEM 80'S REMAKES: About Last Night (1986), Robocop (1987), and Endless Love (1981). (Has this ever happened before? Probably but if it has please to remind me)  

The piece is really funny and also has one of the best lines ever uttered about The Witches of Eastwick:

Cher, Susan Sarandon, and Michelle Pfeiffer — the closest thing to an all-Beyoncé Destiny’s Child we’re ever going to get...

And speaking of the 1980s...

Exit Music
Readers of a certain age already know and love the awesome 80s bad Berlin (so many classics like "The Metro" "Masquerade" "No More Words") but younger movie-mad readers should also familiarize. For somewhat obvious reasons it's oft-forgotten that Terri Nunn, the lead singer was an actress before joining Berlin and was in the running for Princess Leia before George Lucas decided on Carrie Fisher! Berlin's biggest hit was the Oscar-winning Best Original Song "Take My Breath Away" from Top Gun... but they didn't write it so no Oscars for them. Anyway, they have a new record coming out called "Animal" and the lead single's video co-stars my personal favorite RuPaul's Drag Race diva, Raven. Raven loves the 80s -- remember her "I was giving Michelle Pfeiffer Bitch" on the show? She's a perfect fit to face off with Terri! 

Nominee Luncheon: Who Was Amy Adams Last Time?

According to People magazine...

Amy Adams says she wants to "feel like myself" this year when it comes to her Oscars dress

Which sort of begs the question 'who did you feel like last time, Amy?' for all of those nominee dresses.

Hmmm, I'm thinking she felt like Sarandon, Cate, Uma and Penélope? How about you?

Original Song: Pharrell Will Sing "Happy" at the Oscars

One down. Four more Three more songs to go (unless I missed an announcement)...

It's official: there will be Song performances at the Oscars. Pharrell Williams, fresh off his hat-loving Grammy success, will be performing Despicable Me 2's hit song "Happy", currently #11 on Billboard's Hot 100 and rising, on Oscar night. No word yet on the other songs up for the gold but if anyone other than Idina Menzel is asked to sing "Let It Go", currently #26 on Billboard's Hot 100 and rising (and when was the last time two Original Song nominees were actual hits???), I hope there are protests / riots. I'm not even a huge Idina fan but come on! (Still it'd be just like the Oscars to pull something like that.)

Stay tuned...

Related: Aural Oscar Charts, Song Nomination Revoked