March 2, 2007 GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE 9
eveningsout
The Oscars lacked pizzazz, but still broke new ground
by Kaizaad Kotwal
Although the nominees were the most diverse ever, the Academy Awards telecast lacked pizzazz and sparkle. In recent years the ceremony has gotten a reputation for being boring, long-winded and out of touch with the audience. The February 25 show seemed to cement that reputation for good.
This is a shame given that host Ellen DeGeneres certainly has all it takes to make a great show. As she has proven with her daytime talk show, even an out lesbian can connect with the most middle of America. Yet she failed to create a show that had any energy at all. As the first openly gay host of the Oscars, she didn't meet the expectations many had of her comedy, with its trademark intelligence and savvy.
To be fair, it is not so much Ellen's fault-although she is likely not to be invited
back as it is that of the producers,
who have reportedly tried to reign in everyone so tightly that the fun, the craziness and even the
overbloatedness of the show were all but dead. The proof is in the first Emmy Awards after 9-11, where DeGeneres managed to do a bang-up job under very difficult circumstances.
To her credit, Ellen did start the show off powerfully. Referring to much of the hateful speech in the last yearMichael Richards' racist rant, Mel Gibson' anti-Semitism and Tim Hardaway's homophobia-DeGeneres said that it was time to come together. Then, she joked: "If there weren't blacks, Jews and gays, there would be no Oscars. Or anyone named Oscar, if you think about that.”
It was nice to see DeGeneres address the gay issue, along with the others, because on her talk show her own sexuality, or that of others, is often nowhere to be seen.
Ellen's insistence on a kinder, gentler Oscars may not have been the best on her s show
choice and what works on
doesn't necessarily make for a great awards show. She had some nice gags
--
asking Steven Spielberg to take a
Melissa Etheridge raises her Oscar after winning for Best Song.
photo of herself and Clint Eastwood, giving Martin Scorsese a script she had supposedly written, vacuuming the auditorium and asking Penelope Cruz to watch for her gorgeous, overflowing gown.
Who would have ever thought that Al Gore, renowned for being too stuffy, would have one of the best gags of the evening? When he and Leonardo DiCaprio came up to talk about global warming, Gore's pet issue and the subject of his Oscar-winning An Inconvenient Truth, DiCaprio pushed him to announce a presidential run. Gore finally relented and pulled out a piece of paper-and was cut off mid-sentence by the "time's up" music.
The two stars of the evening ended up being Gore and Melissa Etheridge, who won for her song in An Inconvenient Truth, "I Need to Wake Up." She performed the number prior to winning Best Song. That a song from a documentary was even nominated for the category is a rare feat.
"I Need to Wake Up" beat out three nominated songs from Dreamgirls, making Etheridge one of the most unexpected winners of the evening. She was also deserving, because unlike the completely forgettable pablum from Dreamgirls, Etheridge's song is not only great music, it also redefines political art in search of social change. Etheridge thanked her wife Tammy Lynn Michaels and their four children for their support. Before going up to receive the award she kissed Michaels in front of a global audience of over 1 billion people. Although small gestures in the grand scheme of things, the kiss and referring to Michaels as her wife were magnified by the importance and reach of the Oscars.
A cancer survivor, Etheridge looked radiant and clearly surprised by her win. Like many that evening, she thanked Gore.
"I have to thank Al Gore for inspiring us, inspiring me, showing that caring about the Earth is not Republican or Democrat, it's not red or blue; we are all green," she said. Gore himself echoed those comments when his film won for Best Documentary. "People all over the world, we need to solve the climate crisis. It's not a political issue. It's a moral issue."
There were other LGBT-related winners that night, although these Oscars were no match to previous years in that regard.
The most nominated film of the evening, Dreamgirls, was directed by out director Bill Condon. It won two statuettes: Sound Mixing and Best Supporting Actress for Jennifer Hudson's turn as Effie White.
Eddie Murphy, also from Dreamgirls, who was considered the front runner in the Best Supporting Actor category, was upset by Alan Arkin from Little Miss Sunshine. The film openly deals with queer issues, including Steve Carrel as the gay uncle of a young girl accepted into a child beauty pageant. It is a wonderful testament to what it means to be family today in America.
Made for about $7 million, the quirky yet soulful comedy has become a Hollywood success story, is closing in on over $100 million worldwide gross.
Arkin plays the girl's grandfather. He was humble and eloquent in victory. "Acting for me has always been and always will be a team sport. I cannot work at all unless I feel a spirit of unity around me,” he said. “More than anything, I'm deeply moved by the open-hearted appreciation our small film has received, which in these fragmented times speaks so openly of the possibility of innocence.'
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The film's other win came for its young and astute screenwriter Michael Arndt for his outrageously funny and utterly human screenplay. He revealed the inspiration for the road trip in the film:
"When I was a kid, my family drove 600 miles in a VW bus with a broken clutch. It ended up being one of the funnest things we did together."
Continued on page 10
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