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Sunday, February 25, 2007Vital CorrectionOops. Nat Gertler informs me that the actors who were played on with the theme from the old Spider-Man cartoon were Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst. Shows you how much attention I was paying. • Posted at 9:33 PM · LINKMore Oscar ThoughtsThey played Queen Latifah and John Travolta on with a song from the forthcoming movie of the musical, Hairspray, which both are in. Shouldn't the Academy wait until the movie is out before it gets that kind of plug? The Best Acting Oscars this year went to people playing Idi Amin and Queen Elizabeth II. If you were an actor trying to decide what kind of role was most likely to get you an Academy Award, what would you deduce from this trend? Okay, Scorcese finally won. At any given time, there's always that one glaring omission...that one person who you can't believe never won an Oscar. Who is it now? It's over...well, except for nineteen minutes of end credits. What's the official running time? Three hours and forty-nine minutes? Something like that. Lord, how people are going to curse about that. They're playing the song, "Hooray for Hollywood." Amazing. I haven't been so shocked since I went into an Italian restaurant and I heard a Sinatra record. Like I said, I think Ellen did an okay job. I doubt they'll ask her back but then again, I didn't think they'd ask her in the first place. It's a shame there doesn't seem to be anyone like Hope or Carson who can lend an air of importance to the proceedings by their very presence. With most hosts these days, the show makes them important. It used to be the other way around. That's it from Tinsel Town. I'm going back to a script that's due tomorrow. • Posted at 9:29 PM · LINKThis Just In...The Supreme Court has just ruled 5-4 to give the Academy Award for Best Documentary to Jesus Camp. • Posted at 8:52 PM · LINKMid-Oscarcast ThoughtsEllen DeGeneres is doing a decent enough job as host. To some extent, she's making the same mistake Letterman made when he hosted, which was to think this was an episode of his regular talk show but with some award presentations inserted. But Ellen is so self-effacing and pleasant that it doesn't get in the way of the proceedings. I suspect the telecast will be faulted for its sheer length...but it always is. I was surprised her monologue wasn't sharper. It seemed to get things off to a sluggish start. So did the overlong montage of nominees making cute remarks. Another slow starter was the lack of what they call "major awards" during the first hour or so. Usually, they give out one of the Best Supporting trophies right off the top in order to ramp up the energy. Bet they go back to that next year. What I'd do: If I were in charge of the broadcast, I'd dump all the backstage antics, all the stuff in the wings. Who cares? Hyping what's coming up next is another way of saying, "Hey, we know it's dull but if you'll stick around, it may get exciting." I'd also drop the little trivia facts as the winners walk to the stage. It's not that long a period to expect people to pay attention. Is it a requirement that when you win an Oscar, you have to either hold the statuette up like a Price is Right model or raise it over your head like it's a "power to the people" salute? When someone wrote the theme song for the 1967 Spider-Man cartoon series for Saturday morning, do you think that person or persons ever dreamed it would someday be used to play on a presenter — in this case, Leonardo DiCaprio — at the Academy Awards? I've been fast-forwarding so I may have missed one but I don't think we've had a joke about Britney Spears or Anna Nicole or the Lady Astronaut in Diapers or even a line about Joan Rivers out on the red carpet. If so, good for Ellen, good for the writers. Wouldn't Steve Carrell be a good Oscar host? The silhouette dancers are interesting but when the show feels long — and this one sure does — audiences get very unappreciative of "extras" like that. Lastly for now: If anyone voted for An Inconvenient Truth because (as per the Evanier Theory), they thought Al Gore would give an acceptance speech of historic proportions, I think they got shortchanged. It was pleasant enough. People who already didn't like Gore are probably already bitching about it on some message board but they'd complain about anything he said. I like him and I'm complaining because he could have looked the world in the eye and said something they'd all be talking about the next day. And that's why he made the movie: So people would talk about Global Warming. It wasn't a bad moment but it was an easily-forgotten one. By the time we get to Best Director, no one on the planet will even remember what Gore said. • Posted at 8:27 PM · LINKWatching the Pre-Show...I'm catching a little of the Academy Awards Red Carpet arrivals on KABC Channel 7 at the moment. I sometimes feel sorry for everyone who has to make small talk in these situations. The interviewers have to gush over the interviewees and the interviewees have to gush over everyone and everything. So far, the only thing I've heard that departs from that script is Steve Carrell saying it was an ordeal to spend time in a trailer with Greg Kinnear because of Kinnear's bad personal hygeine. But I think I can see why a lot of folks across America think that people in Hollywood are different. Maybe it's just the DirecTV satellite feed but it looks like everyone in the movie business tonight is just a little bit out of sync. Out in the heartland when people talk, their lips match up with their voices. • Posted at 5:22 PM · LINKWrong Turn in WonderlandWell, it worked out pretty much as we expected. Some of us thought Boomerang was going to run the 1966 Hanna-Barbera version of Alice in Wonderland this afternoon commencing at 1:45 PM. Here — here's what the online TV Guide listing still says...
That's the description of the '66 H-B version but what they ran instead was a 1995 animated version of Alice in Wonderland produced by Goodtimes Entertainment, primarily for the home video market. I don't know that this is Boomerang's fault. I never saw them explicitly advertise the '66 H-B Alice. Perhaps the confusion was elsewhere. On the other hand, the Boomerang folks are to blame for the fact that they advertised the show as starting at 1:45 and it actually began at 1:50. That means that if you were TiVoing the program before it, which was the 1974 Hanna-Barbera animated version of Cyrano (with José Ferrer voicing the title role), your recording would have clipped off the last minute or two. I don't know why they do this. I can't imagine any possible upside for the network to not give out accurate start/end times. And it's not like these are live shows and no one knows how long they'll run. • Posted at 2:42 PM · LINKComing At Ya... |
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February 26, 2007
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© 2008 Mark Evanier Hosted by Dreamhost |
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