It may not be Oscar season, but the SCC Library is now
stocked with the best Academy Award-winning films of 2019 on DVD. Such as...
1917 – Best Cinematography, Best Visual Effects, Best Sound Mixing
A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood – Best Supporting Actor (Tom Hanks)
Bombshell – Best Makeup and Hairstyling
Ford v Ferrari – Best Film Editing, Best Sound Editing
Harriet – Nominee, Best Actress (Cynthia Erivo)
Jojo Rabbit – Best Adapted Screenplay
Joker – Best Actor (Joaquin Phoenix), Best Original Score
Judy – Best Actress (Renee Zellweger)
Knives Out – Nominee, Best Original Screenplay
Little Women – Best Costume Design
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood – Best Supporting Actor (Brad Pitt), Best Production Design
Pain and Glory – Nominee, Best Actor (Antonio Banderas), Nominee, Best Foreign Film
Parasite – Best Picture, Best Original Screenplay, Best Director (Bong Joon-Ho), Best Foreign Language Film
Toy Story 4 – Best Animated Feature
Pretty great lineup of award-winning features, right? And speaking of the Oscars, what could be a better opportunity to review some of the weirdest bits of
trivia concerning Hollywood’s famous awards ceremony? Let’s take a moment to
congratulate the winners of …
1. Best Sibling Rivalry
In 1941, Olivia de Havilland was nominated as Best Actress
for Hold Back the Dawn. Spoiling the
moment for Olivia was her younger sister, Joan Fontaine, receiving the same
nomination that year for Suspicion. Though
the two made efforts to appear gracious in public, a childhood of bitter
competition for mama’s approval became a bitter competition for the Academy’s
love. Joan took home the Oscar, but the sisters became estranged, engaging in
occasional public feuds until Joan’s death in 2013. Olivia not only eventually
received two Oscars to his sister’s single win, but outlived nearly everyone in
Hollywood, still with us today at the age of 103.
2. Least Nominated
Cinematographer Hal Mohr holds the distinction of being the
only Academy Award winner who was not officially nominated. Mohr won his Best
Cinematography Oscar for A Midsummer
Night’s Dream in 1935 as the result of a write-in campaign. Talk about a
popularity contest! The Academy has since changed the rules to disallow
write-in votes.
3. Best Snub
Not everyone who wins an Oscar is all a’tingle with delight.
When Dudley Nichols won for Best Screenplay (The Informer) in 1935, he was in a snit about the Academy’s ongoing
conflicts with the Writer’s Guild, so he refused the award. George C. Scott
went Dudley one better by not only refusing to accept his 1970 Best Actor award
for Patton but publically slandering
the ceremony as a “two-hour meat parade.” But the Best Snub award goes to
Marlon Brando, who refused his Best Actor Oscar for The Godfather to protest Hollywood’s depiction of Native Americans.
Brando sent Apache activist Sacheen Littlefeather to the awards ceremony to
read a statement on his behalf, eliciting both boos and cheers for the
political protest. Ah, the Seventies.
4. Most Deceased
Screenwriter Sydney Howard was the first person to receive
an Oscar from the Great Beyond (for Gone
with the Wind in 1939), and both Peter Finch and Heath Ledger received
“Best” awards for films released shortly after they had died (for Network and The Dark Knight, respectively). However, the Most Deceased award
clearly goes to composer Larry Russell, whose Best Musical Score Oscar for
Limelight was awarded in 1972, eighteen years after his funeral.
5. Best Windbag
By a long shot, Greer Garson holds the record for longest
Oscar Acceptance speech. Winning her Best Actress award for Miss Miniver in 1942, Garson, with
finishing school poise, delivered a six-minute speech, pontificating on the
nature of awards and their meaning in a world of sacrifice. It’s no wonder that
the Academy began strictly enforcing a 45-second cap on acceptance speeches or
that Garson never again won an Oscar.
6. Least Dressed
At the 46th Academy Awards in 1974, David Niven
was onstage, awaiting the arrival of Elizabeth Taylor to announce the winner of
Best Picture. Instead of Liz, a notoriously naked man named Robert Opal
“steaked” across the stage, flashing the peace sign. Streaking, the art of
sudden public nudity, was enjoying a popular trend during this period, and Opal
was a keen practitioner. Opal often streaked at city council meetings in Los
Angeles to protest the ban of nudity at public beaches, but this appearance was
definitely his most glamorous. The Best Picture winner was The Sting, but by that time nobody cared.
7. Biggest Losers
1977’s The Turning
Point received eleven Oscar nominations, but didn’t win in any category. In
1985, The Color Purple also gained
eleven nominations and won no Oscars. Could this be the unlucky curse of the
number eleven? Or could it be the unlucky curse of films which center on female
characters? Choose your own conspiracy!
8. Best Most Noms
With 52 nominations, composer John Williams holds the record
for most Oscar nominations. He also has 6 Emmy nominations, 25 Golden Globe
nominations, and 71 Grammy nominations. It helps that John Williams has
composed the original score for every single motion picture released since 1968
(citation needed).
9. Most Delayed
In 1973, Charlie Chaplin’s film Limelight won an Oscar for Best Original Musical Score. Oddly, this
was a full twenty years after the film’s release. Chaplin was on a promotional
tour of Great Britain for Limelight in
1952 when he was informed that his
reentry visa to the United States had been refused. This being the “red scare”
period in America, Chaplin’s communist sympathies were frowned upon by
government officials, and Limelight received little to no distribution in this
country. Twenty years later, having finally become eligible for Academy
consideration with an official Los Angeles theater release, Chaplin won his
only competitive Oscar.
10. Worst Best
There have been many films criticized over the Academy’s
history as being undeserving of their Best Picture Oscars. 1944’s Bing Crosby
vehicle Going My Way is generally
regarded as a real stinker (and was an upset win over the masterful Casablanca). The lackluster How Green was My Valley stirs resentment
for winning over both Citizen Kane
and The Maltese Falcon in 1941. And
the less said about Crash winning
Best Picture in 2006 the better.
Still, based on reviews and retrospectives of Hollywood
classics, it seems no Oscar winner is more universally panned than The Greatest Show on Earth, winner of
Best Picture in 1952. It’s generally assumed that the Academy wanted to award
director Cecil B. DeMille for a lifetime of cinematic achievement and
considered this their last chance. Ironically, DeMille made one last, far
superior film, The Ten Commandments,
which lost out for Best Picture in 1957 to Around
the World in 80 Days, another film now considered one of the worst to have
won Best Picture. Better luck next time, Cecil.
Works Cited
"Academy Awards." Schirmer Encyclopedia of Film, edited by Barry Keith Grant, vol. 1, Schirmer Reference, 2007, pp. 1-9. Gale in Context: U.S. History.
Edelman, Rob. “Mohr, Hal,” Writers and Production Artists, edited by Sara Pendergast and Tom Pendergast, pp. 612-614. International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers, 4th ed., vol. 4, St. James Press, 2001. Gale in Context: Biography.
"Garson, Greer." The Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives, edited by Kenneth T. Jackson, et al., vol. 4,Charles Scribner's Sons, 2001, pp. 200-203. Gale in Context: Biography.
"Olivia de Havilland." Encyclopedia of World Biography Online, vol. 33, Gale, 2013. Gale in Context: Biography.
Rosenberg, Jennifer. “Academy Award Trivia and Interesting Facts,” Liveaboutdotcom, Dotdash, 14Jan. 2020, https://www.liveabout.com/academy-awards-interesting-facts-1779239.
