Book Review of “50 Oscar Nights: Iconic Stars & Filmmakers on Their Career-Defining Wins“ by Dave Karger. Running Press Adult, 272 pages.
Scott Sublett
At the top of every MGM picture, a golden motto encircles a roaring lion: “Ars Gratia Artis“. Though a for-profit corporation, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer nobly scorned filthy lucre and transitory glory. “Art for Art’s Sake.“ Oddly enough, all the artists I know want everyone, everywhere, to praise and purchase their work. One recalls what George Bernard Shaw said to Samuel Goldwyn in 1921, soon after the sly, old playwright had won his Nobel Prize: ‘The difficulty between us is that you care for nothing but art and I seem to care for nothing but money.’ In 1939, Shaw would win an Oscar for his screen adaptation of Pygmalion, and while he called it an “insult,“ he nevertheless displayed it prominently on his mantelpiece.
The truth is that artists do want to be seen, to be paid, and to be handed glittering prizes, for example, the glitteriest of all, the Oscar. For decades, millions of people worldwide have eagerly tuned in to see them handed out, which is only natural, given our primate biology: a study of male rhesus macaque monkeys showed that they would forgo food rewards for the opportunity to view high-ranking monkeys. Of course, we humans can view high-ranking primates while gorging on unlimited snacks. Such is evolution. As for the primates who get the prizes, they benefit greatly and not just in obvious ways. Prof. Donald Redelmeier at the University of Toronto found that people who win Oscars have life expectancies four years longer than those who were nominated but did not win. Win
ners of multiple Oscars? Even longer. For humans and monkeys, too, social status is strongly linked to lifespan.
David Karger, in his book 50 Oscar Nights: Iconic Stars & Filmmakers on Their Career-Defining Wins, interviews actors, directors and designers about the big night. Apparently, the statuette is very heavy and if you have two on your mantelpiece people are apt to pick up both and do curls. The moment of getting the Oscar is often described as a “blur,“ or winners “black out,“ or dissociate. You will forget to thank someone. A great majority of the winners, even the ones who went in heavy favorites, claim they didn’t expect to win and in fact ‘never dreamed’ of getting an Oscar. Really? Because I suspect that almost all actors, film people, theatre folk, and maybe even you, kind reader, at some point in childhood or adolescence practiced delivering an Oscar speech. In fact, I found myself doing it again, while reading Karger’s book. I’m hugging to my bosom the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, and addressing my husband, in the audience, Benedict Cumberbatch. I point at my Oscar. ‘Sweetie,’ I say to Benedict, ‘I love you—but I’m sleeping with him tonight.’ Benedict laughs and slaps his knee, while thinking, “Turning gay really was the right decision.“
In Karger’s interviews, one’s lover isn’t always as supportive as Benedict. After Marlee Matlin won for Children of a Lesser God, later, in the limo, her lover William Hurt said, “So you have that little man there next to you. What makes you think you deserve it?“ She broke off with him a few months later. Sally Fields’s boyfriend Burt Reynolds ‘was not happy with what was happening to me…He said, “You don’t think you’re going to win anything, do you?“’ What’s sad is that both Hurt and the criminally underrated Reynolds were superb actors, big stars, rich, yet someone else’s success made them bitterly insecure.
Which brings us to the classic narcissism of Joan Crawford. When Rita Moreno arrived at the ceremony at which she would win her Oscar as Best Supporting Actress for West Side Story, she noticed Mommie Dearest giving her “the strangest…evil…envious” smile. Then, when Moreno walked off stage with the statuette, a drunken Crawford, whom Moreno described as ‘built like a linebacker,’ ambushed her and pulled Moreno’s face into her bosom—as Crawford’s photographer snapped away. “My voice was muffled against her bosom. And my face is all being squashed against her linebacker chest. Finally, it took a couple of people to wrest me from her grasp.” Later, Joan wrote Rita a lovely note.
Lest you think you and I were the only ones to write imaginary Oscar acceptance speeches, three of Karger’s interviewees did cop to it, and all three are Black. The first ever black nominee for Best Production Design, Hannah Beachler, who won for Black Panther, recalls, ‘I would stand in the mirror with my brush when I was eight years old and say, “I’d like to thank the Academy.”’ Whoopi Goldberg says she ‘wrote an Oscar speech every year when I was a kid. And my mother and my brother had to sit there while I accepted my Oscar.’ Geoffrey Fletcher, the first Black to win the Award for Best Adapted Screenplay (Precious, 2010), told Karger, ‘I remember one day during senior year in college, I was bored, sort of coasting through senior spring, and I had some aluminum foil. I started playing with it and I made an aluminum foil Oscar. I still have it somewhere in the bottom of a box.” Fletcher didn’t quite mention a speech, but once you’ve made your aluminum foil Oscar, we can assume.
Like all glory, it’s transitory. ‘I got a lot of attention for a moment,’ said Keith Carradine, who won Best Original Song in 1976. ‘I was on the party list there for about six months.’ Or, as Aaron Sorkin said, ‘By the next day you’re thinking, Well, one Oscar is good, but I should really win two. You get to be happy for roughly 24 hours.’
The most sensible observation of all was made by Emma Thompson (Best Adapted Screenplay for Sense and Sensibility), who said, ‘I’m British—there’s no way I’m going to say, “I love you, Mum” on a stage. That’s a private matter. Awards ceremonies are professional ceremonies for professional people who’ve done something that other professionals like.”
But…will Benedict be hurt if I leave him out?
