Monday, March 06, 2006

The Oscars


We went to Elaine's new place for her annual Oscar party. I said she was nuts for selling her old place on Central Park West but now that I've seen the new one, I understand completely.

This was one of those years where I hadn't seen any of the nominated films so I gave the telecast a cursory glance. Jon Stewart was good and his politically slanted bits, especially the smear campaign ads voiced by Colbert, were fantastic. George Clooney also had one of the funniest acceptance speeches I've ever heard.

But I hadn't realized until now that my favorite part of the show is "In Memoriam." You know, the part where they show you everyone in Hollywood that has died over the last year. I love this. I want to be sad and surprised at the same time. "Oh my God, Joe Ranft died!" You get to elbow your friend. "He was a storyboard artist from PIXAR! He worked on 'Corpse Bride'!" It's sad without being too sad.

1 comment:

Cromely said...

I never used to understand the way my parents responded to that section of the show when they listed all those people no one ever heard of.

Each year, though, I now recognize more and more names from that list.

And it starts to make sense.