William Ross will conduct the Oscar orchestra for the Academy Awards, show producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron announced this week.

“We are happy to have Bill Ross conduct the Oscar orchestra,” said Craig Zadan and Neil Meron. “With a show so rich with music, we are so pleased to have someone as talented as Bill on our team.”

Ross, who conducted for the 79th and 83rd Academy Awards, is a prolific award-winning composer and arranger whose work encompasses feature films, television and the music recording industry. He has arranged music for artists such as Barbra Streisand, Celine Dion, Josh Groban, Andrea Bocelli, Michael Buble, Kenny G., Sting, Quincy Jones, Seal, Mariah Carey, and Whitney Houston. The records on which he has worked have sold a total of over 250 million copies in the United States.

Ross has written original scores for such films as ‘The Tale of Despereaux’, ‘Ladder 49’, ‘Tuck Everlasting’ and ‘My Dog Skip’. He also adapted and conducted the score to ‘Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets’.

Oscars for outstanding film achievements of 2012 will be presented on Oscar Sunday, February 24, at the Dolby Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center, and will be hosted by Seth MacFarlane live on the ABC Television Network. The Oscar presentation also will be televised live in more than 225 countries worldwide. For more information go to Oscar.com or download the official Oscars app.

Image Courtesy : William Ross

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Dame Shirley Bassey will make a special appearance on the Oscars, show producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron announced last week.

“We are thrilled to welcome the legendary Dame Shirley Bassey to our Oscar show,” said Craig Zadan and Neil Meron. “Her association with film music is world renowned and we are proud that she will be making her first Oscar appearance on our telecast.

Bassey is this year celebrating her very own “Diamond Jubilee” with a career spanning over six decades. She has recorded over 44 albums, sold over 135 million records and has sold out concert halls across the world. In June 2012, she was one of a number of esteemed artists, including Elton John, Paul McCartney and Annie Lennox, who performed at the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Concert. In the United States, Bassey is best known for recording the theme songs for the James Bond films “Goldfinger,” “Diamonds Are Forever” and “Moonraker.”

Bassey joins a stellar list of previously announced Oscar performers including Adele, Norah Jones and Barbra Streisand; and presenters including ‘The Avengers’ cast members Robert Downey Jr., Samuel L. Jackson, Chris Evans, Jeremy Renner and Mark Ruffalo; returning 2011 Oscar winners Jean Dujardin, Christopher Plummer, Octavia Spencer and Meryl Streep; co-stars Mark Wahlberg and Ted; and, special guest appearances including Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Daniel Radcliffe, Channing Tatum and Charlize Theron.

Oscars for outstanding film achievements of 2012 will be presented on Oscar Sunday, February 24, at the Dolby Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center, and will be hosted by Seth MacFarlane live on the ABC Television Network. The Oscar presentation also will be televised live in more than 225 countries worldwide. For more information go to Oscar.com or download the official Oscars app.

Image Courtesy : Dame Shirley Bassey

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Marvel’s ‘The Avengers’ cast mates Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Samuel L. Jackson, Jeremy Renner and Mark Ruffalo will present together on the Oscar stage, show producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron announced last week.

“We are happy to re-unite the ‘Avengers’ cast to present on our show,” said Craig Zadan and Neil Meron. “Audiences who enjoyed the year’s biggest box office hit will be excited to see these terrific actors back together again.”

Downey has twice been nominated for an Oscar, for his leading role in ‘Chaplin’ (1992) and for his supporting role in ‘Tropic Thunder’ (2008).

Evans, who will be making his first Oscar show appearance, will be seen in the upcoming ‘The Iceman’.

Jackson was nominated in 1994 for his supporting role in ‘Pulp Fiction’.  He can also be seen in this year’s Best Picture nominee ‘Django Unchained’.

Renner was nominated for his leading role in 2009 Best Picture winner ‘The Hurt Locker’ and for his supporting role in ‘The Town’ (2010).  Renner had roles in this year’s ‘The Bourne Legacy’ and ‘Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol’ (2011).

Ruffalo received his first nomination for his supporting role in 2010 Best Picture nominee ‘The Kids Are All Right’.

Oscars for outstanding film achievements of 2012 will be presented on Oscar Sunday, February 24, at the Dolby Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center, and will be hosted by Seth MacFarlane live on the ABC Television Network. The Oscar presentation also will be televised live in more than 225 countries worldwide.

Craig Zadan and Neil Meron are producers of critically acclaimed and award-winning feature films, television movies, series, and Broadway productions. Their feature films include ‘The Bucket List’, ‘Footloose’, ‘Hairspray’, and ‘Chicago’, which won six Academy Awards including one for Best Picture. For television, they’ve produced films of ‘Steel Magnolias’, ‘Life with Judy Garland’, and ‘A Raisin in the Sun’, among many others and the series “Smash” and “Drop Dead Diva.” They recently returned to their roots in live theater by producing Broadway revivals of the Tony-winning “Promises, Promises” and the Tony-winning 50th Anniversary revival of “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.”

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A strong sense of place has always been a hallmark of director Alexander Payne‘s work but with ‘The Descendants’ it would become even more central. From the beginning, he and his crew of frequent collaborators were acutely aware that they were going where few filmmakers have gone before by following an intimate family drama into the lush fabric of Hawaii.

All of the conflicting juxtapositions of contemporary Hawaiian culture — modern and ancient, urban and wild, growth and preservation — became wrapped into the film‘s design, from the photography to the sets. The newest of the U.S. states, Hawaiian history goes back 1500 years, when Polynesian explorers first sailed canoes by the light of the stars to the fertile string of volcanic islands. Later, settlers arrived from across Polynesia – Tahiti, Samoa and Tonga – forging a distinctive matriarchal culture with its own language, customs, art forms and legends.

In 1810, King Kamehameha, Chief of the Big Island, united all the islands into one Hawaiian Kingdom. Soon after, Christian missionaries began to arrive, followed by colonialists from mainland United States. In 1893, a group of American businessmen overthrew the Hawaiian monarchy, paving the way for annexation. Meanwhile, the culture continued to evolve and adapt, merging elements of American values with native Hawaiian ways.

When Hawaii became a U.S. state in 1959, it was dubbed the ‘Aloha‖ state’, reflecting the impossible-to-translate Hawaiian word that conveys an open-hearted spirit rooted in a love of the land.

“My grandfather, he really loved this place. So did your mother. So does your mother.”

– Matt King.

To capture the islands as they are today — as rife with developers and suburbia as they are with laid-back surfers and Polynesian traditions — with a fresh eye, Payne reunited with director of photography Phedon Papamichael, who previously worked with him on ‘Sideways’. As soon as he read the script, Papamichael knew it was going to be something different. “It was a very dialogue-driven story, which usually means the film will be less visual,” he begins.

“But in the case, the opposite was true. Because of the way the Hawaiian setting is juxtaposed with the King family‘s struggles, the visuals take on a major role. It was going to be very important to capture the beauty and nature of the surrounding environment so you can understand the conflict Matt feels over selling his family‘s land.”

Papamichael divided the film between two Hawaiis: the more hectic, citified Hawaii of Honolulu and the stunning, natural Mecca of Hanalei Bay on the island of Kauai, draped with verdant, tropical rain forests and surrounded by sapphire seas. “We really wanted to give a feeling for the community in Honolulu but also the beauty of the coast so you understand what could be lost and the connection to history that is there.

That‘s why we decided to shoot wide-screen, which Alexander has only done once before, on ‘Election’,” he explains. “We decided that it would be a lot of fun to have that epic frame with these small, human figures confronted with the majesty of the landscape.”

At the same time, both men wanted the film to stay true to Payne‘s distinctively unadorned style, which is almost an anti-style. “I like to bring an almost documentary style to fiction filmmaking,” says Payne. “It gives the story a sense of reportage.” Papamichael concurs.  “With Alexander, one of the biggest assignments is always to make sure the photography doesn‘t get in the way of the story. He really loves realism, to the point that if we go

to a location and there are tree trimmers working nearby, he says ‘great‘ and he embraces that as part of what‘s going on in the scene,” he explains. “Or, for example, when we shot in the bar where George Clooney meets Beau Bridges, it was very important to Alexander to have the real locals who frequent the place be in there to get that feel of reality. The same goes for lighting. It‘s always very natural, to the point that the audience should never realize that they‘re watching a crafted film.”

He continues, “We really want the audience to be taken in by the characters without distraction. The emotions are so intense and the writing so strong, we don‘t need to add visual drama.” Hawaii, however, often brought its own drama. “The light there is challenging because it is constantly changing,” notes Papamichael.

“It can go from overcast to sunny in the time frame of one shot. Fortunately, both Alexander and George, being a filmmaker himself, are very good at reacting in the moment so you can switch scenes around. It gave us a lot of flexibility.”

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As Matt King, the protagonist of Oscar-winner ‘The Descendants’, tries to find his footing as a father to Alexandra and Scottie, he is surrounded by friends, foes and relations who keep throwing him off course. The cast of characters that complete the ensemble that the three Kings run into on their journey towards reconciliation are an accomplished ensemble of actors hand-picked by director Alexander Payne.

Note: There following may contain spoilers.

“The casting in this film provided a new and interesting challenge for John Jackson and me — to piece together not just a believable nuclear family but also an extended family and a community of friends as well — all of whom inhabit a fairly narrow enclave of class and race,” says Payne.

For the catalytic role of Brian Speer, the mysterious real estate agent Matt King is chasing throughout much of the film, Payne cast Matthew Lillard, the tall, versatile actor best known for his comic performances and as Shaggy in the Scooby-Doo movies. When Lillard read for the role, he was convinced it was the longest of long shots.

“I walked in, and there were like five great looking guys waiting to read, all of them with that California movie star thing, strong chins and pecs and biceps,” he recalls. “I thought to myself, ‘There’s just no way.‘ I already know that the chances of me playing George Clooney’s wife’s lover are pretty slim.”

Lillard gave it his all and was satisfied just to have elicited praise from Payne. But four months later he was stunned when he received a call from Payne saying “I‘d love to have you be a part of this movie.” Payne recalls that Lillard‘s speedy approach clinched it. “I like it when actors act fast. Later I told him that he should do more of his audition with his kids in the car,” remarks the director.

For Lillard, it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. “Your whole life as an actor you look for the chance to be part of an experience that is this special,” he says. “I don‘t think I would ever have been the standard casting choice. I think I‘m outside the box, but that‘s what makes Alexander such a great director. He has the ability to make choices that set his body of work apart.”

As for Brian, who unwittingly becomes Matt King‘s greatest nemesis but also perhaps his liberator, Lillard says, “He‘s a real go-getter. He‘s a family man who truly loves his wife and kids as well, but he has a fatal flaw. He saw a financial opportunity with Matt‘s wife, only he got himself in too deep, too fast and suddenly, he‘s in the middle of an incredible situation.

What‘s fun about it is that George Clooney goes on this whole transformative journey of hunting my character. But then, Brian becomes a kind of oracle who sends him back to his family to find a way through.”

Another actress known primarily for her comedic abilities, Judy Greer, recently seen in the TV series ‘Mad Love’, was cast as Brian Speer‘s wronged wife, the seemingly soft-spoken Julie, who first runs into Matt King on a blissful Kauai beach. Greer was taken by the way her character defies expectations and is much more than comic fodder.

“She‘s a very modern mother figure,” Greer observes. “She‘s earthy and sensitive and committed to keeping her family together no matter what. I like that Alexander put a very calm and grounded human being into this situation.”

When the situation nevertheless explodes into chaos, it is Julie, not Brian, who finds herself at the center of a turbulent scene showing up at the hospital to make amends with Matt‘s comatose wife, only to find herself going off on a bedside rant. Greer could empathize with Julie‘s reasoning even if her behavior turns shocking. “I think Julie goes to see Elizabeth because she is confused and concerned,” says Greer. “Maybe she just wants to see the other woman.

When you find out your husband‘s been cheating, you‘re taken over by feelings of jealousy and inadequacy and anger and sadness and maybe she just wants to get a look at the woman who ruined everything she thought she had. She also has an incredible amount of compassion for Matt‘s situation. The beauty of the scene and the way that it is written is that it is all of these things at once. She becomes taken over by what she‘s really feeling.”

Image Courtesy of   Joe Seer / Shutterstock.com

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The HBO Documentary Films presentation ‘Saving Face’ received an Academy Award in the category of Best Documentary Short at the 84th annual Academy Awards, presented at the 2012 ceremony of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on Feb. 26.

Every year in Pakistan, many people – the majority of them women – are known to be victimized by brutal acid attacks, while numerous other cases go unreported. With little or no access to reconstructive surgery, survivors are physically and emotionally scarred, and many reported assailants, typically a husband or someone else close to the victim, are let go with minimal punishment from the state.

Debuting Thursday, 8 (8:30-9:15 p.m. ET/PT), exclusively on HBO, ‘Saving Face’ chronicles the arduous attempts of acid-attack survivors Zakia and Rukhsana to bring their assailants to justice, and follows the charitable work of Dr. Mohammad Jawad, a plastic surgeon who strives to help them go beyond this horrific act and move on with their lives.

It was a very happy directional team who accepted the Academy Award for Best Documentary Short. They were up against ‘The Barber of Birmingham: Foot Soldier of the Civil Rights Movement’; ‘God is the Bigger Elvis’; ‘Incidents in New Baghdad’; and ‘The Tsunami and the Cherry Blossom’. After leaving the stage, Daniel Junge and first time Pakistani directional winner Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, had an extra opportunity to express their gratitude

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In the newly Oscar-winning film ‘The Descendants’, Alexandra‘s overbearingly boyish and goofy best friend Sid, played with abandon by rising teen star Nick Krause, is an interloper into the King family who winds up making his own iconoclastic mark on their road adventure. “Sid kind of serves as Alexandra‘s comic relief,” Krause says, so they hang out together, especially in troubled times.

Sid is so laid back that he‘s completely forgotten any social standards. He never knows what to say or how to put anything tactfully. Even though he always means well, he just doesn‘t know how to express it.

That dismaying lack of tact often leads Sid into trouble — as it does when Alexandra‘s grandfather hauls off and socks him for giggling at his wife. The scene became one of author Kaui Hart Hemmings‘ favorites on screen. “I like it because it’s absurd but it also feels so real,” she says. “It‘s almost all dialogue. I really like the moments in a film where not a lot happens, and yet a lot happens.”

“I mean, how often do old people just haul off and cold-cock you in the face?”

– Sid

Yet, no matter how much Sid provokes the people around him, he also becomes an unlikely uniting force. “I think Sid really grows to be a part of the family while they deal with all these crazy situations that are just stacked one on top of another,” Krause says. “His journey is about becoming part of a new family. He starts out as this kind of stoner guy meeting a friend‘s dad but by the end of the story, he and Matt have a deeper understanding of each other.”

Note: There may be spoilers in the following.

Producer Jim Burke sees Sid as an essential link in the story. “He winds up allowing Matt to connect to his daughters in a way that he never could have if Sid was not there,” says the producer. “Towards the end, he realizes Sid might be the only guy he has to talk to.”

Sid becomes his confessor, although a very unusual one. Like Sid, Matt‘s long-time friends Mark and Kai have a galvanizing effect on the King family — as the only ones who have the real scoop about with whom his wife was cheating. Taking the roles are two actors who both emerged from the comedy world, Rob Huebel and Mary Birdsong. Huebel was excited to be part of one of the film‘s most dramatic scenes, as Matt bursts into their house out of the blue, demanding immediate details on his wife‘s affair, even as she lies in a vegetative state.

Huebel and Birdsong had to walk a tightrope balanced between angst and absurdity. “It‘s a tricky scene because it‘s serious but it has to be funny, too,” notes Huebel. “Mark and Kai are horrified because they knew this was going on and we‘re supposed to be Matt‘s best friends. We try back-pedaling, we try getting out of telling him, we try defending Matt‘s wife, but it only makes Matt angrier. In the end, Mark wants to retain his friendship with Matt, so he tells him the identity of the man his wife was sleeping with. I think that‘s what most guys would do.”

The nervy, multi-layered scene worked, Huebel says, mainly because of Payne‘s ability to set his cast completely at ease. “He‘s just the most precise director I‘ve ever worked with,” he observes. “He had already imagined every nuance and every gesture by the time we were doing the scene and you really feel like ‘oh we‘re going to be fine, because he‘s driving the boat’.”

Birdsong sees Kai as being in a particularly precarious position when Matt finds out about the affair because her loyalties are split. “Matt‘s wife Elizabeth was her closest friend,” she explains. “Now she‘s torn between her devotion to Elizabeth and telling the truth. To her, Elizabeth was this amazing free spirit and now she wants to protect her.”

Like Huebel, Birdsong gives credit to Payne for taking a chance on casting actors from diverse backgrounds. “He has a very original and individual brain,” she describes. “And I think the casting of the film is a testament to his sensibility. He saw something in each of us that would help the story.”

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Some of the filming for Alexander Payne’s ‘The Descendants’ took place off terra firma – in swimming pools and the ocean. Legendary underwater photographer Don King came in to help with the scene where Shailene Woodley releases a primal scream while at the depths of the family swimming pool.

Recalls Woodley, “He waited for me underwater with this crazy-looking camera. I would submerge myself and swim towards him and he would swim backwards super quickly, timing it perfectly with me. It was a fantastic scene to shoot.

Note: The following may contain spoilers.

One of director of photography Phedon Papamichael‘s favorite experiences on ‘The Descendants’ was filming the climax of Matt‘s road trip as the Kings arrive at their ancestral land on Kauai and young Scottie makes Matt rethink the idea of selling it to strangers. “We designed the shot so the family drives up the mountain but you‘re not really aware of what‘s coming.

It almost feels like a normal tracking shot but then, as they come to the edge of the land, we boom up and reveal this spectacular view, and suddenly, the characters are overwhelmed by the beauty. That was one of my favorites,” sums up Papamichael.

Payne also reunited with production designer Jane Ann Stewart, who has worked on all of his films since the very beginning of his career. Stewart says that Payne‘s aesthetic instincts jibe with hers. “His sense of humor is very much like mine – absurd, a little macabre and where nothing in the human condition is above comedy,” she says.

She knew her work was cut out for her when Payne approached her for this film. “We both had to learn a lot about Hawaiian culture, and really immerse ourselves in it, so we could get to the history, the sense of place and the texture behind the story,” she explains.

In creating Matt King‘s house, Stewart consulted both with the novel and its author, Kaui Hart Hemmings. “Kaui‘s advice was invaluable,” says Stewart. “For example, she introduced me to the punee [the casual Hawaiian daybeds often used as sprawling sofas] and helped us to reflect the family‘s history in the details.”

When Stewart found a local house that had the right feel, it was missing one key element – the sprawling banyan tree that graced the front yard in the book. So Stewart had one transplanted. “It kind of reflects the idea of family because of the way each branch reaches in and plants itself,” she observes.

As with the cinematography, Stewart‘s challenge was to keep things in Payne‘s favored realm of stark reality, but with a tropical twist. “Alexander always wants the veneer to be authentic, even a little bit banal. But this film was a chance for me to stretch things a bit with the colors and exotic essence of the place. I just had to have a very good reason for putting anything, a piece of furniture or painting, in a room. It had to support the characters and stay true to the place.”

That authenticity to Hawaii deeply moved Hemmings when she visited the set — and she could see her story coming to life, reflecting the funny and fraught ways that families, on or off the islands, really interact and bond. “It was amazing for me to be back in Hanalei Bay, where my own descendants first landed,” she says, “and it meant a lot to see the cast and crew getting to know this special, special place.

It was a chance for me to reconnect with my own family and it brought the community together. Writing a book is such a solitary thing, but with a movie, the beauty is in sharing the experience.”

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Among the big winners at last Sunday’s 84th Annual Academy Awards was Belfast-born director Terry George, whose short film ‘The Shore‘ won for Best Live Action Short Film.

George has previously been nominated twice at the Academy Awards, once in 1994 for Best Adapted Screenplay for ‘In The Name of the Father‘, and again in 2005 for Best Original Screenplay for ‘Hotel Rwanda‘. His win for The Shore, however, represents the culmination in a long labour of love which sought to depict Northern Ireland in a brand new light to the world.

The Shore stars Ciarán Hinds, Conleth Hill, Maggy Cronin and Kerry Condon, and centres around a man (played by Hinds) who returns to Northern Ireland after a long absence with his daughter (played by Condon) and forges a reconciliation with an old friend and an old lover (played by Hill and Cronin, respectively). The theme of reconciliation is an important one for George, who served as both writer and director on the project, with him stating in his acceptance speech:

Our little film was inspired by the people of Northern Ireland, Protestant and Catholic, who, after 30 years of war, sat down, negotiated a peace, and proved to the world that the Irish are great talkers. I want to dedicate this to them.

George accepted the award with his co-producer – and daughter – Oorlagh, showing how much this film was a family affair. George shot the majority of The Shore in Killough, a small town in County Down, Northern Ireland, where many of the George family still reside and where George will be making a triumphant return later this week.

The film’s Academy Award success could not have been predicted when it made its initial premiere last April at the Belfast Film Festival, however, since then it has gone on to secure both an international distribution deal and cinema run, a television airing in the UK, and has even been made available for purchase on iTunes for just £1.49.

The success of the film will potentially result in a boom in tourism, but the main hope is that it will lead to an increase in activity for Northern Ireland’s film and television industry. Already this year, American cable dramas Game of Thrones and Sons of Anarchy have shot on location in the country, while the BBC’s upcoming crime drama The Fall, starring Gillian Anderson, has been confirmed to be shooting a significant part of its five-episode order in Belfast in the coming weeks.

All of this would have deemed unimaginable just a decade or so ago, when Northern Ireland was still in the throes of The Troubles. Yet, political advancements in the peace process and George’s own admitted fatigue with the ‘Hollywood’ way of making films all led to The Shore being made possible, and to a potential revision to the outside view of 21st century life in Northern Ireland.

Image Courtesy of   http://theshorefilm.com/

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The 20th annual Elton John AIDS Foundation Academy Awards Viewing Party hosted by Sir Elton John and David Furnish raised $5.25 million for the fight against HIV/AIDS. The gala, which took place on Sunday, February 26, at West Hollywood Park in Los Angeles, was co-sponsored by Chopard, Neuro, and Wells Fargo; American Airlines serves as the Foundation’s official sponsoring airline.

Attendees included Academy Award winning Best Actor Jean Dujardin, Steven Tyler, Gwen Stefani, with her band No Doubt, Quincy Jones, Heidi Klum, Katy Perry, Kim &Kourtney Kardashian, Aziz Ansari, Anna Paquin & Stephen Moyer, Neil Patrick Harris, Dave Grohl, Smokey Robinson, Matthew Morrison, Chace Crawford, Ian Somerhalder & Nina Dobrev, Adam Lambert, Marisa Miller, Alessandra Ambrosio, Whoopi Goldberg, Vanessa Hudgens, Ashley Tisdale, Jessica Lowndes, Mischa Barton, Billie Jean King, Brooklyn Decker, Chris Colfer, Colton Haynes, Darren Criss, Dianna Argon & Sebastian Stan, Dita von Teese, Jessalyn Gilsig, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Karolina Kurkova, Kyle MacLachlan, Liam Hemsworth, Lorraine Bracco, Ted Danson & Mary Steenburgen, Mehcad Brooks, Mena Suvari, Michelle Rodriguez, Miley Cyrus, Natasha Henstridge, Natasha Bedingfield, Paul Stanley, Paz Vega, Petra Nemcova, Ryan Kwanten, Joel McHale, Taye Diggs & Idina Menzel, Paul Wesley, Torrey DeVitto, Michael B. Jordan, Rebecca De Costa, Sandra Lee, Kat Graham, Sarah Hyland, Sky Ferreira, Anika Noni Rose, Gina Carano, Kelly Osbourne and Ziyi Zhang.

Guests arrived at the Academy Awards Viewing Party for cocktails followed by a gala dinner and viewing of the 84th Academy Awards® telecast. This year, Chef Cat Cora, the first and only female Iron Chef on The Food Network’s “Iron Chef America,” prepared an exquisite 5-course meal for guests that included sesame encrusted lamb meatballs with harissa yogurt, sauteed sea bass with lemon couscous and piquillo pepper saffron sauce, and chocolate budino with whipped cream and fresh berries.

The dinner was followed by a lively auction. Auction items included a tennis lesson with 10 time Grand Slam Champion Rafael Nadal that sold for $190,000 twice; an in-home cooking class for up to ten people with Chef Cat Cora which sold for $100,000 to Steve Tisch, owner of the NFL champion New York Giants;

The opportunity to join Elton John and David Furnish at the Vanity Fair Oscar Party that sold for $230,000and a surprise auction lot – a bite from “Vampire Diaries” stars Nina Dobrev and Ian Somerholder, set visit to the show and lunch with Elton John and David Furnish went for $80,000. Following the auction, Foster the People took the stage to perform several songs including their hits “Pumped Up Kicks”, “Helena Beat” and “Don’t Stop (Color on the Walls)” much to the crowd’s delight.

The HIV/AIDS virus was first observed by physicians in American patients 30 years ago and while tremendous strides have been made in our understanding of this terrible disease, there is still a lot of work that needs to be done and many challenges to overcome.

Twenty years ago, Sir Elton John pledged to the Hollywood community that he would hold this event every year until a cure for HIV/AIDS had been found.  Today, the Hollywood community is still standing with Sir Elton John, showing their support for the Foundation and this worthy cause.

Follow the Elton John AIDS Foundation on Facebook:  http://apps.facebook.com/causes/5321. And on Twitter @ejaforg.

Image Courtesy of   http://www.flickr.com/photos/evarinaldiphotography/

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Cirque du Soleil  presented a wholly unique and exclusive performance for the 84th Academy Awards on Oscar Sunday, February 26. The one-time-only event featured the largest Cirque cast ever assembled for a single act.

To view the multimedia assets associated with this release, please click: http://www.multivu.com/mnr/54694-cirque-du-soleil-84th-academy-awards-exclusive-performance-danny-elfman. More than 50 international artists from Cirque du Soleil productions around the world converged in Los Angeles to bring the dynamic showcase to life.

The act featured aerialists, Icarian acrobats, hand balancers, dancers and characters from IRIS, A Journey through the World of Cinema along with the 15-member Banquine team from Viva ELVIS in Las Vegas and a hand balancer from Zarkana, direct from Moscow’s Kremlin State Palace Theatre.  The act was accompanied by music from Academy Award-nominated composer Danny Elfman, who scored the music for Cirque du Soleil’s IRIS, A Journey through the World of Cinema.

Cirque du Soleil presented the performance as a tribute to the movie theatre experience incorporating signature Cirque acrobatic elements and imagery along with classic film clips.

The act marked the second time Cirque du Soleil performed during an Academy Awards telecast.  The troupe’s first appearance, at the 74th Academy Awards, sparked discussions about creating a permanent show at the theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center and resulted in the creation of IRIS.

Academy Awards for outstanding film achievements of 2011 were presented on Sunday, February 26, at the theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center, and televised live by the ABC Television Network as well as being televised live in more than 225 countries worldwide.

About Cirque du Soleil
Since 1984, the company has brought wonder and delight to more than 100 million spectators in over 40 countries in more than 300 cities on six continents. Cirque du Soleil has 5,000 employees, including more than 1,300 performing artists from close to 50 different countries.

Image Courtesy of    http://www.flickr.com/photos/beaconradio/

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The award for Best Original Score at the 2012 Academy Awards went to the French composer Ludovic Bource for his compositions featured in the movie The Artist. This was Bource’s first nomination, and he triumphed over such Oscar veterans as John Williams, Howard Shore and Alberto Iglesias. Bource  earlier also won the Golden Globe for his composition.

Credit: Darren Decker / ©A.M.P.A.S.

The Artist is a silent movie about the end of Hollywood’s silent movie era. For this reason, it is easy to understand the important role played by the score. In this particular style of movie, the music score not only is a magnificent support to the storytelling, but also fulfills the role of spectacular protagonists, as well as carry the mood of the movie.

Credit: Greg Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Ludovic Bource began his acceptance speech at the ceremony by underlining the importance of music: “Wow, I want to pay, first of all, a tribute for the power of the music,” he said, then adding; “I’d like to thank the Academy; with this Oscar you have given a man a special honor. And to all of you, please accept me because I’ve got so much love to give.”

Ludovic Bource incorporated a variety of different sounds and moods in the score of The Artist; he sought inspiration from several directions. In an interview with ‘Classic FM,’ he said that he started by studying the period that inspired the movie, namely the 1920s-40s. This era saw the birth of jazz and swing, both of which influenced contemporary movie scores. Bource took inspiration from films like ‘Tabu: A Story of the South Seas’ and ‘Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans,’ among others. He then turned to the classical compositions of Tchaikovsky, Brahms, Wagner, and Debussy before creating his own sound for the film.

Credit: Greg Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

The score was recorded with the Flanders Philharmonic Orchestra in Brussels. Although nothing is certain yet, rumor has it that there is a project for Bource to tour the world with a live orchestra, performing the compositions that thrilled the voters of the Academy Awards  to a live audience. In the interview with ‘Classic FM’ he expressed the specific desire to perform in London. The live tour would also visit several other cities in the world, including New York, Los Angeles, Paris, Brussels and Geneva. The tour experience is a throwback to the days of silent films, when movies were accompanied by live orchestras.

Image Courtesy of  Matt Petit / ©A.M.P.A.S. (Top Image)

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Gore Verbinski was celebrated last night for his first animated venture ‘Rango’, taking home the golden statue for Best Animated Feature. “Someone asked me if this film was for kids and, I don’t know, but it was certainly created by a bunch of grownups acting like children and we just had the best time,” the director and screenwriter said in his acceptance speech.

Verbinski is best known as the man behind the successful ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ -trilogy and his working relations with Johnny Depp, who depicted the swashbuckle galore of Captain Jack Sparrow, has led to the colorful collaboration for Rango. “I want to thank the real-world chameleon, Mr. Johnny Depp,” said Verbinski, “and the entire cast for coming out and playing.”

It doesn’t get any better than this, thank you.

After leaving the stage, the eager Oscar press corps were ready to ask about the win.

Q. So you developed this movie completely outside of the studio system completely by design. I’m wondering if you feel like there’s a message in that for other people who are trying to do really off the wall pictures?

A. It helps when you’re friends with Johnny Depp. I mean, we needed money and, you know, once Johnny said he was in, it was things started to happen. But we didn’t go right to a studio we went to Graham Graham King who gave us enough money to do the story reel. So for the first 18 months we were just out of our house, seven artists and John Logan, long walks you know, barbecues in the backyard. It was great.

Q. What is the takeaway for you as a filmmaker having done this and gone back and forth now between live action and animation?

A. This it’s a pretty profound question. I mean they’re two completely different hats. I suppose underneath all of it it’s just, you know, finding a story you want to tell in the same way you would as you were if you were sitting around a campfire or something. But completely different. I mean there’s no there are no gifts in animation. We have to fabricate everything including the anomalies, you know, and yet now I’m two days into shooting a live action picture. I actually go back tomorrow to shoot, and you know, there’s chaos and you can’t you can’t orchestrate things exactly how you want them, but when events happen, they’re set in stone and you’re done. So completely different hat. I mean, I don’t know how else to explain it. It’s just every every aspect of it is so different.

Q. You did something a little unorthodox in this film. You actually put all the actors in the same room and had them act. How much do you think that contributed to the success of the film?

A. Well, I don’t know about the success, but I don’t know any other way to direct actors. I mean, it’s I want them to act and react. I suppose it I think it made it feel like it was occurring and we encouraged line overlaps and we encouraged people to be out of breath. So we really were kind of paranoid of the computer making things clinical, and it so lends itself to perfection. So suddenly you had the feeling I guess in the soundtrack that there was a tortoise talking to a lizard, because Johnny was talking to Ned Beatty and they were actually playing the scene together. So I think there’s there’s something in there. There’s some sort of DNA underneath it all. But ultimately it was just a fear of having somebody sit with a bit of text in front of a microphone. I mean, I haven’t done that since I was selling sugar water, Budweiser, you know, or whatever, doing commercials, but that’s so distant from, you know, getting a performance.

Q. Gore, if you ever allowed yourself to dream of winning an Oscar, did you hope that it was going to be for a live action or for animation?

A. I don’t know. I feel like I’m dreaming right now, so I don’t I don’t think it matters. I mean, it’s here. It’s in my hand. It’s very heavy. It feels good.

Q. All right. As a friend of Johnny Depp, can you possibly describe what makes him fascinating? What makes him deliver even in an animated film, something more than any other actor could?

A. Well, I think every actor has a different process. He just, you know, really is brave in kind of pursuing the sort of awkward moment in trying to find something that’s not really rehearsed, or to try to find a way to approach something. If the lines are in one way, he’ll always come at it a different way. So I just, I think we have something in common in that sort of pursuit of trying to find working it until it’s genuinely a little off.

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The heartbreaking tale of acid violence in Pakistan and the women victimized by the heinous practice won the category of Best Documentary (Short Subject) at this years Academy Awards, celebrated at the Hollywood and Highland Center last night.

Directors Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy and Daniel Junge followed the work of Dr. Mohammad Jawad in his native Pakistan where he performed reconstructive surgery on survivors of acid attacks. The film explores the problem as the women struggle for justice and the return of a dignified life.

Credit: Greg Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Daniel Junge took the word at first by saying “it’s more important that the Pakistani on the stage speak instead of me” to which Obaid-Chinoy responded:

Daniel and I want to dedicate this award to all the heroes working on the ground in Pakistan including Dr. Mohammad Jawad who’s here with us today, the plastic surgeon working on rehabilitating all these women, Rukhsana and Zakia who are our main subjects of the film whose resilience and bravery in the face of such adversity is admirable, and to all the women in Pakistan who are working for change, don’t give up on your dreams. This is for you.

The brief but beautiful speech was met by applause and the Oscar press corps welcomed the shaky, but thrilled winners afterwards.

A. (Daniel Junge) This is only a third less nerve racking than being up there. But still all the same. I think it’s important to note that this is the first Pakistani director nominated and now winning an Academy Award, which is really worth yeah, applaud. Thank you.

Q. Sharmeen, in an interview with Voice of America, you said that winning an Oscar was never a destination, it was never a goal in front of you. What does Oscar mean for you?

A. (Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy) Well, I think that it reinforces the fact today that you can be anyone and come from anywhere, but if you put quality work out there, that it will be judged on just that; the work that you put out there. And I think that some of the choices that the Academy’s made today an Irani film has won, a Pakistani film has won shows that, yes, the Academy does value good work that’s put out across the world, not just in North America.

Q. What would you like for Americans to know about Pakistan that we probably don’t know?

A. (Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy) That it’s possible that women like myself are born and raised there, emancipated, educated women, who return back to Pakistan to give back to that country. I lived in the United States for ten years. I went to college here and worked here, and I chose to go back because people like myself need to go back to create change in Pakistan.

Q. When you look back at the challenges that you have to go through while making this movie and, obviously, you overcame them, how do you feel about that now that you’ve won the Oscar?

A. (Daniel Junge) Any and all films are challenging, especially for we documentary filmmakers and even more so when you are documenting such dark, difficult subject matter. But I think that the fact that we were able to find redemption within the film and the fact that such that inklings that a hint of change happened while we were in the film is really as valuable as this, but not quite.

Q. Being the first filmmaker from Pakistan to win, can you tell us what kind of film industry you have in Pakistan? Is it thriving or is it also affected by the worldwide trend?

A. (Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy) In the fifties and sixties we had a vibrant film industry. Unfortunately, after that, it sort of died down. And now my generation, there are a number of filmmakers, we are trying to revive that, but it’s few and far between. And I hope that this will be an impetus to getting a more flourishing film industry in Pakistan.

Image Courtesy of   Matt Brown / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Credit: Greg Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

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It was the documentary of the struggle of a high school football team which found its way to the winners podium at last nights celebration of the 84th Academy Awards. The feature, directed by Daniel Lindsay and T.J. Martin, follows the Manassas Tigers of Memphis as the three main protagonists, three underprivileged student-athletes make an attempt to beat the odds and turn years of losses into a winning season.

Climbing the stage to accept the statue, Dan Lindsay joked “A year ago today we were sitting in our editing room, depressed thinking nobody was ever going to see this movie and a friend said, ‘don’t worry, next year you’ll be at the Oscars’ and we said, ‘you’re an idiot.’ So we’d like to take this opportunity to apologize to him and say you’re a lot smarter than we thought.”

Credit: Greg Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

His fellow winner T.J. Martin added “We would also like to acknowledge our fellow nominees. They have inspired us in so many ways.” After the acceptance speech, the Oscar press corps received the elated winner backstage.

Q. How do you feel right now after, you know, with the Oscar on your hand is like?

A. (T.J. Martin) Surreal? I need someone to come up and pinch me. Thank you, Rich, this is really happening. Oh, my God.

A. (Daniel Lindsay) It was funny. I said to we went out into the lobby area right before the awards and had some champagne and just gave each other a hug and said, look, win or lose, this is incredible, I don’t know what happened, but and we just said, you know

A. (T.J. Martin) Win or lose, just getting nominated is, like, a phenomenal achievement for us, and again, like, so much of this, we can’t we could not thank the community of North Memphis enough for, like, we should not be the ones standing up here. They are the ones who actually their trust in us in telling their story is what enabled our success.

A. (Daniel Lindsay) Someone else is being way funnier than TJ.

Credit: Matt Petit / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Q. One of the things I’ve been saying is, this is one of the few categories that people get behind, get excited about. Can you talk about why documentary is such an invigorating category this year?

A. (Daniel Lindsay) First of all, I think there’s an unbelievable grouping in films. I mean, ‘Paradise Lost’, they freed three people out of jail, and that’s incredible. ‘Hell And Back Again’ is one of the most cinematic documentaries I’ve ever seen in my entire life. ‘Pina’ is pushing boundaries. Pushing boundaries is beautiful. ‘If A Tree Falls’ is intelligent and inspiring. Documentaries, I think it’s partly because of the technology, there’s a

A. (T.J. Martin) It democratizes it.

A. (Daniel Lindsay) Yes. There is a way to make films that you couldn’t make before and you can tell stories that you couldn’t tell before, and I think people just, you know, look, I don’t know if, like, people are clamoring for something genuine. And I don’t know, I think we’re sick of manufactured stuff, but I’m not going to make a statement.

Q. Congratulations, guys. I watched the film the other day and I loved it, but I wanted to ask you, there’s been a lot of questions about the whole issue of race with this, and the fact that once again we have the white coach and the black players, and I was just wondering for you, when you set out to make it, was it at all an issue, and I noticed since Mr. Combs is in back of the room, if he wanted to come up and address that issue as well with you?

A. (T.J. Martin) I’ll address it happily. When we first discovered the community of North Memphis, that’s what really, when we felt the absolute need to tell the story because I think between the three of us we’ve done a fair amount of traveling within the U.S., and I don’t think we’ve ever seen poverty on that level. So, once we got there and recognized that race and class was not an issue for both the volunteer coaches and the players, they didn’t see each other, the players didn’t see Coach Bill as their white coach and Coach Bill did not see his players as his, you know, African American players. So, for us, it was not our duty to bring in that element of it, if it wasn’t a reality for their, you know, for their day to day.

With that said, there was no way we were going to shy away from the socio economic, kind of, dynamics of the stage of the film and of the community, and at the end of the day I actually really appreciate that question because the whole point of it is what really inspires the conversation about race and class. It’s just the beginning of the conversation. We’d never say that we’re an authority figure on that, but we’d say it’s time to actually talk about it.

Credit: Todd Wawrychuk / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Q. Your film was situated in North Memphis, and West Memphis Three, which is ‘Paradise Lost 3’, was in West Memphis. Was there any coincidence that you guys might have crossed each other’s paths as documentarians and also both films look at issues of race and poverty from a completely different perspective, but was there any kind of bond or something when you were in North Memphis at the same time?

A. (Daniel Lindsay) I think the fact that you asked that question kind of relates to the question before, the fact that those aren’t just issues, class, poverty, it doesn’t have to do with anything with race, they’re two stories that deal with two different races, but it’s class and what that means to our society. But no, we never we met Joe for the first time in the nominees lunch and he’s been a hero of ours forever. I think I’ve seen ‘Brother’s Keeper’ 40 times. But we didn’t even know they were doing that film while we were there, which is kind of crazy. But no, I guess Memphis breeds good stories, I don’t know.

A. (T.J. Martin) We should add that we never set out to make a social issues based film. Our whole intention was to tell a wonderful human interest story, really a coming of age film, and that hopefully, once again, inspired a greater conversation and a greater dialog.

Image Courtesy of   Richard Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S. (Top Image)

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The seeds of a memorable film most often comes from the craftsmanship of a well-written screenplay. For the Oscars 2012, the winners in the categories Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Original Screenplay were equally expected as they were surprising.

Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon and Jim Rash were awarded for their delicate adapted drama ‘The Descendants’, capturing the inner turmoil of a fractured family and personal chaos of an estranged father and betrayed husband. Backstage, the Oscar press corps caught up with them.

Credit: Greg Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Q. I was wondering, from their first draft, what did you keep, what did you like, because I’m under the impression that you just rewrote everything and shot with your version of the script. And I’m just wondering what you kept from what Jim and Nat did.

A. (Alexander Payne) They paved a path for me because they had been through the book quite a few times, they had done a number of drafts. I think the main things you know, I’ve got to say in all honesty it was helpful for me to read their drafts both for what I kept and what I didn’t keep. I was able to sort of they gave me the luxury to be able to pick and choose what I personally responded to. What I didn’t keep, for example, was more screen time with the younger daughter rather than with the older daughter. For example, I was much more interested in the relationship with the older daughter. Two items in particular which I did keep, neither of them, sadly, made it in the final film, the girl singing “that shit is bananas.” Anyway, in one scene, you have to read the script, it’s not interesting to talk about.

And at the very end something also maintained, carried over from the novel, which was kind of a joke at the end of the what became in the film we hope a poignant spreading of the ashes, there was a joke which punctuated that. We shot that, that didn’t make it into the final film. But the [unintelligible], it’s just a matter of taste what one picks and chooses from a novel.

Credit: Todd Wawrychuk / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Q. I recently saw you were at the Spirit Awards. And you talked a lot about taking original work and making it your own, so I was just curious about what you took from the book and how you put your own original spin on it.

A. (Jim Rash) Well, I think, you know, after our first draft, actually I’m meeting with Alexander and our producer, Jim Burke, and getting some notes, that was sort of a thing that Alexander said to us to put the book aside for a second and get ourselves into understanding this character better. So I think it was more to sort of be able to put that away for a second and expand on it and let the scenes and the emotions there carry us through it, you know, and brighten that story.

Credit: Michael Yada / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Q. Mr. Payne, like the novelist William Kennedy’s ties to Albany, you have very profound and deep ties to Nebraska. And now that this Hawaiian story is over, what is the next part of your Nebraska identity, Nebraska roots, cultural ties and moves, and where does Nebraska fit into your future, sir?

A. (Alexander Payne) It’s been ten years thanks for the question. It’s been ten years since I’ve shot there and I haven’t shot there since ’01 since ‘About Schmidt’ and I’m anxious to go back. If I can cast it right, the next screenplay I’m involved in directing is a father son road trip from Billings, Montana to Lincoln that gets waylaid in a small town in central Nebraska. I’m from Omaha, so in a way my trying to interpret small town Nebraska is as exotic an endeavor as going to Hawaii. But I’m anxious to do so. I’m having trouble casting it, quite frankly, but I hope it works out.

Credit: Todd Wawrychuk / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Q. Why?

A. (Alexander Payne) Because the characters I didn’t write the script, by the way, I rewrote it, but I didn’t originate it. They’re very specific. I’m having trouble finding specifically people to fill those roles.

For Best Original Screenplay, Woody Allen’s ‘Midnight in Paris’ ran off with the glory. The quirky romantic comedy about the protagonist Gil, who is swept away in the magic of the Parisian night as he is caught up in a professional, and personal crisis, is cited as one of Allen’s best films in recent years.

The 76-year-old was not present to claim his awards, having consistently avoided the Academy Awards and his recognition within it throughout his career. The Academy accepted the statue on his behalf.

Image Courtesy of  Fox Searchlight (Top Image)

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The 2012 Oscars was a spectacular night, reminiscent of more succesful Oscar eras past as well as making history for foreign artists. Jean Dujardin became the first French actor to win Best Leading Actor, ‘Saving Face’ marked the first win by a Pakistani director, and the breathtaking drama ‘A Separation’ ran off with the award for Best Foreign Language film, gaining the extinguished pleasure of being the first Iranian movie to do so.

Director Asghar Farhadi is known for his admirable ability to convey the details of modern Iranian society and made an unfaltering portrayal of a family, struggling to come to terms with their disagreements, their responsibilities and the constraints of their culture.

Credit: Michael Yada / ©A.M.P.A.S

It was a politically tinted acceptance speech that followed the win; director Farhadi noted the immense joy that his achievement would bring his nation. “They are happy not just because of an important award or a film or a filmmaker, but because at the time when talk of war, intimidation, and aggression is exchanged between politicians the name of their country, Iran, is spoken here through her glorious culture, a rich and ancient culture that has been hidden under the heavy dust of politics.”

He continued, “I proudly offer this award to the people of my country, the people who respect all cultures and civilizations and despise hostility and resentment.”

Backstage, the Oscar press corps caught up with the director and asked him in depth about the obvious geo-political facets of his win.

Q. Congratulations. You’re the first winner from Iran. Obviously the Iranians are so happy for you right now; they’re excited all around the board. What is your message to the people and how this award can impact their lives, especially in such a difficult time?

A. I’m very happy about this award and I believe that Iranian people are also very happy, and this is what really matters to me. I don’t think this would have any specific message to the Iranian people other than the fact that cultural activities are the most important factors that we need to stick to in the world. I will be very happy to know that the image that the world gets from our country, Iran, is a very clear image, that it’s not a vague image. If people around the world try to find the image of one another through the prism of culture, I believe that image would be a more real and a more clear image.

Credit: 84th Annual Academy Awards®

Q. Many congratulations to you. What is it about A Separation which has made it connect with so many people around the world?

A. It is difficult for me to point my finger to a specific thing, but I think what matters is that even though this film was a local film, it could still relate to all people around the world because it is about human relations. What happens in this film is not specific to a region or a geography and perhaps this is the reason why this film is understandable by people throughout the world like Australia, America, Middle East.

Q. Hi, I’m from Israel. And I wanted to know particularly does Iran follow the Oscars at all, and does it mean anything that Iran was nominated with Israel?

A. People in Iran follow the Oscars a lot more than you think they do, and I know for a fact that right now as the event is happening, it’s in the middle of the night in the middle of the morning and people are not sleeping, and I know that they’re following. And perhaps the reason why they follow it this year so closely is because by every means it is a cultural event for them and they would like to hear the name of their country through culture.

Credit: Darren Decker / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Q. I’m from Polish television. Congratulations. You won over ‘In Darkness’. I wonder whether you saw Agnieszka Holland’s movie and if you could please comment on it.

A. Yes, I have seen the film and more than the film I am very much honored by the director herself, and I love her work and believe in her not just for her work but for her humanity, and I saw her a few weeks ago and she told me that even though her film was nominated in the same category, she voted for my film, and to me this was the ultimate greatness of a human being. I believe that your country should be very proud of such a great director who is a great filmmaker and a great human being.

Q. Can you give us an update on how Iranian government has officially reacted to the claim that your movie has won and how you think they’ll react to this Oscar?

A. I really don’t know and I can’t predict what’s going to happen so I’m just going to wait and see how they respond. The Iranian government is not unanimous at all. When this film was nominated some were very happy, some were excited, and some were not as happy, so it’s not like you have the same level of people in the system. To me what matters is that the people of Iran are happy.

Q. Congratulations. The issue of tension, especially nuclear tension between Iran and the United States is very strong right now and frankly a lot of people in this country don’t know what to think of Iran, so what kind of message does your film want to send as you try to communicate between people and not government?

A. What you refer to is what’s happening between the governments, and I don’t have any message for the governments because I believe that this film is communicating with the people and I don’t think that government people are really into cinema.

Image Courtesy of  Michael Yada / ©A.M.P.A.S. (Top Image)

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Immediately following the Academy Awards show, the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences hosts its traditional Governors Ball, an exclusive evening event where presenters, nominees, winners, and Hollywood insiders come together to celebrate the conspicuous end of the years most esteemed film award show. Those in attendance will enjoy Moet and Chandon Champaign and will be catered for by the master chef himself, Wolfgang Puck. We tried the food and beverages offered at the event and here are our conclusions.

Credit: Dalia Alkassar & Tamir ElSahy / The Toonari Post

Wolfgang Puck forgoes the traditional main course formality for this year’s menu in an attempt to create a more simplistic and youthful theme. With over 50 dishes, there’s truly something for everyone. Standing out among the many bits of treasure are one-bite hors d’oeuvres such as the miniature Kobe beef burgers and small-plate entrees, like the more down to earth macaroni and cheese. We asked Wolfgang Puck about his inspiration for the theme behind this year’s gala. “Lots of small pieces, almost Japanese-like. It’s more of a lounge kind of party this year, not a formal dinner,” he said.

Credit: Dalia Alkassar & Tamir ElSahy / The Toonari Post

Over 300 Wolfgang Puck chefs will be firing off a powerful array of hors d’oeuvres for the nights 3,000 or so attendees. Seafood will be one of the principle ingredients in the Governors Ball menu this year. A nicely crafted smoked salmon resting on an Oscar-shaped flatbread drizzled with caviar also lent itself to the event. The nights guests will also be offered delicious gold wrapped baked potatoes with caviar and crème fraiche, interesting pizza combinations, lobster tacos, and chicken potpie topped with shaved black truffles, to name a few. Puck’s intention to create a wide variety of items for this menu works because it encourages everyone to just have fun.

Credit: Dalia Alkassar & Tamir ElSahy / The Toonari Post

3-D glasses are given out for guests to appreciate a chocolate based placard with the 3-D image of the Oscars imposed on it, which we assume many will have fun with as they watch those on their table consume three dimensional chocolate desert placards. However, in this the Oscars theme particularly stands out. Not necessarily because the 3-D, Oscar inspired white-chocolate placard standing atop a decadent staircase of red chocolate mousse and chiffon cake isn’t a wonder to look at, which it really was. Rather, it was the sheer amount of differently sized gold-dusted chocolate Oscar statues serving as a constant reminder of the significance of film in the background, bouncing nicely off the surrounding red and golden hues, that helps make this menu a true creation for the Oscars, worthy of the nights daringness.

Credit: Dalia Alkassar & Tamir ElSahy / The Toonari Post

As the exclusive champagne of the Academy Awards, Moet and Chandon will also be offering its own Academy Award inspired, rose-pedal garnished cocktail, appropriately called the “Moet Red Carpet Glamour”.  The excellent cocktail pairs the famous Champaign with earthy ingredients such as ginger and cardamom, combined with sour mix and Hum botanical spirits.

Credit: Dalia Alkassar & Tamir ElSahy / The Toonari Post

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At last, one of the most respected contemporary actresses in Hollywood won the golden statue last night in what turned out to be one of the best Academy Award shows of the new millennium. Surprise was written all over the 62-year-old actress’ face as her name was announced by last year’s Leading Man, Colin Firth.

credit: Matt Petit / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Meryl Streep was awestruck but composed as she approached the stage and gracefully accepted the statue. In her speech, she reminisced about her long career which includes 17 Oscar nominations to date — making her the most nominated actor in the Award’s history. Her last win was almost 20 years ago so this year was a welcome release of appreciation for the revered actress.

Backstage, the eager Oscar press corps were ready to quiz the newly-made third-time winner.

Q. I wanted to ask you about what you said on stage because you said that it would probably be your last time there winning an Oscar?

A. Yes, I’m pushing the tolerance.

Q. Maybe you don’t want to give Katharine Hepburn a run for her money?

A. Did she have more?

Q. Four.

A. Oh, well, okay.

Q. No, but really, how did you feel winning this third award, and why did you think

A. Oh, I was thrilled. I thought I was so old and jaded, but they call your name, and you just go into sort of a, I don’t know, a white light. And it was just thrilling. It was like I was a kid again. I mean, it was I was a kid when I won this, like, 30 years ago. Two of the nominees were not even conceived. So, you know, it was great. And it was doubly wonderful because my long time collaborative colleague, Roy Helland, makeup man, hairdresser, he won too, and he won for not an outside he won with his colleague Mark Coulier, who is a great British prosthetics designer, but he won not for some, you know, monster making, but for making a human being, and it’s very unusual in that branch that they give it to somebody who’s just trying to transform people. And so I was really, really proud for him.

Q. In researching your role, did you have a chance to meet Margaret Thatcher?

A. No, I haven’t. Really, she has retired from public life almost entirely now in the last two years. So, no, I didn’t. But I studied her, and I studied, you know, there’s so much archival footage. And then the challenge was to imagine her present life, and that was completely an active imagination on Abi Morgan, the writer’s part, and my part, but there was a lot of freedom in that, but also responsibility to a real person and to history. So, it was it was really very, very satisfying as an actor, as an artist, to make a film that starts out about

Q. We love you there, and I’ve been following your career, too, but I am learning that you have very good relationship with a lot of staff member as well as your family. What is the trick of sustaining such a deep, good relationship in such a busy life?

A. You can ask every working woman that question and get a million different answers because it’s it’s the juggle and the challenge that we have, but honestly, in my life, because it’s in the arts, I don’t go to work every day. So my day has been more flexible than other working women. Even when I was young and broke, I could I was only working ever for four months at a time, and I was unemployed. So my children never knew when I was going to be home. It was very valuable. But, you know, I think it’s a struggle. And it’s an ongoing struggle. Women have to do it all, you know. And so, the more flexible work becomes, the more engaged the dads become, the better.

Q. And my question is, you won for ‘Kramer vs. Kramer’ for the very first time, and then ‘Sophie’s Choice’, and now for ‘Iron lady’. Which one of those was this is impossible question to answer, I guess, but talk about, you know, those different experiences in getting up there and accepting, you know, three times now, what was that you know, what was it like the first time around and the second time around and is this better in some way?

A. I read a poem yesterday, and it had nothing to do with this but it said, one of the lines jumped out and it said, “It is strange to be here once as it is to return.” So, that’s true. It is strange, the whole thing is strange. I mean, if you’re a human being, it’s weird. If you are not, I don’t know. Probably fun.

Q. You had mentioned that it has been a long time since the last time you won. Were you worried that it never was going to happen again?

A. No. I have I mean, I have everything I’ve ever dreamed of in my life. And no. I mean, I think there’s room for other people. Frankly, I understand Streep fatigue. And it shocks me, it shocked me that it didn’t override this tonight. So, I was really, really happy but I don’t take anything for granted, that’s for sure.

Credit: Matt Brown / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Q. Congratulations. In your very moving speech this evening, you mentioned jokingly we might all be sick of you in the future. I hope that doesn’t happen, but it seems like you have the beginning of a second project in life with The Women’s Museum. Would you talk a little bit about that?

A. Thank you for asking about that. There is no national women’s history museum, but there is a lot of history that is not written about the contributions of women in our country and around the world. And I think it would be really, really inspiring for people all around the world to have this fantastic center where you can learn the stuff that hasn’t been written about women, because for many, many centuries, history was not interested in us. And yet, and our history is invisible and I think it would be great for boys and girls to go to a place where they could learn about the contributions of their foremothers as well as their forefathers.

Q. Expounding on that idea, with young girls today, young women watching the Oscars, what advice would you give to them if they are thinking about going into filmmaking or acting?

A. Or anything.

Q. Or anything?

A. Or anything. Never give up. Don’t up, don’t give up. I mean, many girls around the world live in circumstances that are unimaginably difficult. And it’s not, you know, show business is a golf game compared to the way most kids grow up in the world. But I would say never give up. On March 8, 9, and 10, Tina Brown is hosting something called Women in the World in New York, a 3 day symposium bringing activists around the world on behalf of issues concerning women and girls, and it’s a great, great thing. Hope you will write about it and go see it. And thank you very much.

Q. Have you paid tribute to the great work of Roy and Mark on your makeup? Can you describe that moment when you first looked in the mirror and saw the face of Margaret Thatcher looking back at you?

A. Well, by the time we had achieved the right amount of less, and less, and less, I had become acclimated to not looking at Margaret Thatcher in the mirror and thought it was me, and that was important to me that I wasn’t looking at rubber, that I was looking at me. You know, I sort, of at that point in the process of creating a character, I’d already sort of morphed in a way, in my head, and in my heart, with her, and her concerns and her interests, her zeal, her mission, her sense of rightness, and all of that. But honestly, when we first had the old age makeup on, I saw my dad. You know. I looked so much like my dad. Maybe my dad looked like Margaret Thatcher, I don’t know. So, is that the end?

Q. That is the end.

A. Okay. Thank you very much.

Image Courtesy of  Bryan Crowe / ©A.M.P.A.S. (Top Image)

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It was a tearful Octavia Spencer who made her way to the stage after Christian Bale pronounced her the winner of the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. She was helped up the stairs in her tight dress and delivered a heartfelt and sincere speech, marked by her surprise for the win. As the emotions started rolling over her, she hugged the oscar tightly to her chest and tried her best to make sense of her gratefulness. Spencer’s fellow cast members were visibly thrilled about the win and fellow nominee Viola Davis has teary eyes of her own.

credit: Richard Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Octavia Spencer won for her portrayal of the defiant help Minny Jackson who strikes up an unusual friendship with Jessica Chastain’s Celia Foote, as both of them are deemed outcast in the local community by the cold and calculated Hilly Holbrook.

The Oscar press corps grabbed the stunned Spencer after her win.

Q. Are you disappointed that perhaps the film didn’t include that more tragic ending for your character, although it had some low points, it had some, you know, a little bit of a light hearted feel at the end?

A. Well, I think that’s all in your perception. No, I’m not disappointed that that scene was deleted. I think that we wanted to make the movie that Kathryn Stockett had envisioned when she wrote the book. I don’t think there’s anything light hearted about the Civil Rights movement, but somehow it makes it palatable when you see that type of strife. So if you can have a laugh every other ten minutes while you watch the struggle then, you know, I have no problem with it. But no, I’m not disappointed with any aspect of the film.

Q. What will you do? The plans after this movies?

A. Well, tonight I am going to find my cast mates and we’re going to, you know I’m actually going to have a quarter of a glass of champagne and hang out and and I think we all start projects, you know, within the next couple of days. But I’m just going to live in this moment because it’s never happened and lord knows it may never happen again.

Q. There’s something that stuck out to me in your acceptance speech and you thanked your ‘Help’ cast for how they helped you to transform into your character.
A. I said that? I don’t even remember what I said. I’m sorry.

Q. Can you explain how did they help you to do that or you know what your cast really meant to you when you said your family really meant to you?

A. Well, it’s very rare that you have the type of ensemble that we had. You know, you don’t get all the Academy Award nominee winners and Cecily Tyson, Mary Steenburgen, Sissy Spacek, Viola Davis coming together to do a project. And then you have the collaboration of Academy Award nominees behind the scenes. We just left our egos at the door and worked together as one beautiful unit from Emma, Viola, Bryce, Allison Janney. I mean, it was an award winning cast. So to be a part of that and to just sort of dissolve into the world that we were representing is something that we’re supposed to do as actors but it was rare that we did it without judgment with each other.

Q. You originally spoke about overcoming fear in playing your role in The Help. What would you say to a young man or woman about to start in the Army and overcoming their fears?

A. Well, I haven’t really overcome mine. I’m scared to death right now. You know, I don’t take what men and women in uniform do lightly. You guys provide us with the freedoms and the protection that we as citizens sometimes take for granted, so I don’t know that I’m the person that can say because I I’ve not served in that capacity. What I will say is I think I guess I’m reminded of Emerson: Do not go where the path may lead; go instead where there is no path and leave a trail. That’s what you guys do for us every day.

Q. Would you sum up this award season for us and tell us about the love affair you had with The Help?

A. Well, the word I want to use I can’t, it’s a word in the well, I want to say fan effing tastic. But we’ll just leave the effing out. Fantastic. It is it is humbling. It is the love affair I’ve had with The Help, I am I’m a benefactor of all of the riches that the real life Minnys, Aibileens, Constantines, Skeeters, Celias, that they basically repeated. And so I am I’m very humble because I get to stand here and accept this award and I haven’t really done anything. So I don’t know. That’s a tough question to answer. Sorry.

Q. My question to you is, is that when you were walking up those stairs and by the time you got up there, a heartfelt standing ovation was given to you and you went into strictly emotions. What were you feeling at that moment and what would you say to any young girl who would aspire to be in your shoes tonight?

A. Well, get a great designer because you don’t know if you’re going to be on TV or not. And really and truly I was just trying not to fall down because I had an incident where I fell at an awards show. This is one of those evenings in my life that I’ll never forget. I hope it’s the hallmark of more for young aspiring actresses of color, and by color I don’t mean just African American. I mean Indian, Native American, Latin American, Asian American. I hope that in some way that I can be some sort of beacon of hope, especially because I am not the typical Hollywood beauty. You guys are supposed to go, oh, no, you are.

[Laughter]

There’s crickets, guys, work with me here. Work with me.

No, I don’t know. I just think that you have to believe in yourself and you have to work very hard. You can’t ever think that you’re the best thing since sliced bread because I promise you, there are going to be Viola Davises and Jessica Chastains and Emma Stones who are the best thing since sliced bread. So take it seriously, but don’t take it too seriously.

Q. The outpouring of emotion tonight for you and for your movie has been overwhelming, especially considering that you’re a relative newcomer.

A. Well, it depends on who you ask. Fifteen years, I’m a newcomer. Okay, I’ll take it.

Q. Congratulations. This is going to open so many doors for you. In your wildest dreams what is the one role that you want to play?

A. I don’t have one role that I want to play. I guess you know what, I want to be a producer. I want to be an activist. I want to be proactive in bringing about work for men, women, boys, girls, everybody who is good at what they do and deserve a shot at it. So I think my role, I want to have a presence both behind the scenes and in front of the camera. So I can’t say on one particular thing, so I’ll just name them all. I’ll be the jack of all trades and hopefully decent at one of them.

Thank you. Thank you, guys.

Credit: Richard Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

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Last night was the dream night for the beautiful and unconventional film ‘The Artist’. The 2012 Academy Awards was truly a night for artists as solid craftsmanship was celebrated and history was made. One of the delightful results was the well deserved win by the French actor Jean Dujardin for his portrayal of the fading silent movie star George Valentin — an amazing performance that won the Academy’s hearts and votes. It also makes him the first French actor to ever receive the honor.

Credit: Greg Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

Dujardin was tearful as Natalie Portman, last year’s winner in the Leading Actress category, as is tradition, introduced the performances all of the nominees. She noted the exquisite achievement of the French actor and he was visibly moved by the kind words. As his name was announced, the charming smile that moviegoers fell in love with in The Artist spread across his face as he approached the scene to accept the statue

Thank you. Oui! I love your country. Thank you to the Academy. It’s funny because in 1929 it wasn’t Billy Crystal, but Douglas Fairbanks who hosted the first Oscar ceremony. Tickets cost five dollars and it lasted 15 minutes. Times have changed. So thank you Douglas Fairbanks. Yes Melissa, your grandfather’s spirit and joie de vivre inspired me for this role. And so many of you here tonight have inspired me. Thank you Michel, thank you for this incredible gift. Thank you my wonderful partner Bérénice Bejo. Thank you the wonderful cast and crew. My wife, I love you. Kisses Simon, Jules, Chloe. And if George Valentin could speak, he’d say [French]. Merci beaucoup. I love you.

In his excitement, the 39-year-old actor, the youngest of the nominated, was almost unable to contain his joy and looked as if trying to return to the microphone to speak. Backstage, he got the chance.

Q. Sir, with your great success in this silent movie, are you concerned with the effort to make a transition into talkies?

A. (Jean Dujardin) In America? I’m not American actor. I’m a French actor, and I continue in France and but it’s possible. It’s

A. (Interpreter) If he can make another silent movie in America, he’d like to. He knows he’ll always be a French actor in America so he should find roles that, you know, those kinds of roles.

A. (Jean Dujardin) Thank you.

A. (Interpreter) But he has a few ideas that he wants to develop.

Q. At the end of your acceptance speech, did you perhaps drop the French equivalent of the F word?

A. I said it’s amazing. It’s incredible. It’s unbelievable. Thank you. Ah, yes. I’m sorry.

Q. And I’m wondering where your four legged friend is, Uggie, and how you’re going to celebrate with him?

A. (Jean Dujardin) Uggie? Tonight, Uggie is home in Miami, I think. So but, yes.

A. (Interpreter) He went to bed already.

Q. Hello, Jean. I would like to know what was the process of creating this character and was it any different from the way you created other talking characters?

A. It was not really intellectual, and I’m not an intellectual. No, I watch I watched a lot of movies. Douglas Fairbanks movies, Gene Kelly movies. I had fun pretending to be a movie star in 1920s.

Q. Congratulations.

A. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Credit: Greg Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

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The impressive French-American silent movie ‘The Artist’ by director Michel Hazanavicius, will be remembered not just for its unusual way of interpreting the beauty and wistful grace of the end of one of Hollywood’s most precious eras, the silent films, but also for its achievement at this years Oscars.

The French star Jean Dujardin was ecstatic as he accepted the Oscar for Best Leading Actor, making him the first French actor to receive the honor. Michel Hazanavicius can celebrate his own success in winning the price for Best Director and the overall film, which despite its critical acclaim has done meagerly at the box office, will receive a deserved boost by the prestigious Best Picture award.

Of other notable wins were Best Original Score which underlines the tremendous work and power that The Artist held in conveying the drama, comedy and intensity of its story without spoken lines. Ludovic Bource was interviewed by the Oscar Press corps and its translators shortly after winning the golden statue for his work.

A. It’s unbelievable for me.

Q. [Speaks in French]

A. So he said he’s he’s incredibly impressed to be here and the first prize he ever got for The Artist was at the EFA awards, the European Film Awards, and the statue is a woman and so his little boy said, Papa, you need to bring me the man, the Oscar, so that they can kiss each other.

Q. [Speaks in French] It was very moving tonight, your speech, because you said at one point, Well, actually I would like that people accept me here in Hollywood. Why, because I have so much love to give. Can you please explain to us, because I know that actually to make it here in Hollywood you have to love and even be in love.

A. All of the work I did on The Artist was a declaration of love to American culture, American cinema.

Q. [Unintelligible] is a tribute to the American composer. [Unintelligible] the next step for you is in Hollywood.

A. If Hollywood accepts me, it’s my dream to be here. So yes, I would love to give you my love and be part of Hollywood now.

Q. Hi. This is a silent film, and I just wondered for you, the music plays so much a part of this. Do you feel like this was a character in the film?

A. Yes. Music is it’s a character in the movie and it’s a unique language and I’m so honored to have been able to have made this movie thanks to Michel Hazanavicius.

Image Courtesy of  Richard Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

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The enigmatic Christopher Plummer gracefully accepted the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal as a closeted gay man who takes the leap and owns up to his identity when diagnosed with terminal cancer. The announcement, however, comes as a shock to his grown son, played by Ewan McGregor.

The 82-year-old actor was immortalized after appearing in the Oscar-winning ‘The Sound of Music’, which made cinematic history in 1965. Since then, Plummer has enjoyed a diverse career, including ‘The Man Who Would Be King’ (1975), ‘The Silent Partner’ (1978), ‘Malcolm X’ (1992), ‘The Insider’ (1999), ‘Syriana’ (2005) and ‘The Last Station’ (2009).

The Oscar press corps were ready to ask the elated winner about his win.

Q. The obvious question: How does it feel to be the oldest Oscar winner ever?

A. I don’t believe that for a second. I think that Charlie Chaplin, even though it was an honorary Oscar wasn’t he 83? I mean, an honorary Oscar after all is an Oscar, we hope.  I’m not sure, but it feels pretty good anyway.

Q. I’m getting married soon, so I would love to talk about your wife. You’re so romantic when you thanked her for rescuing you. What does that mean and tell me about your wife?

A. What do you think it means? I thought it was abundantly clear. Of course, I’m a naughty boy. I’ve been bad all my life, and she always puts me in line. I think it’s great what she’s done. It’s extraordinary. But it doesn’t strike you when you hear the phrase, “She rescues me every day of my life”? What could be clearer?

Q. Good evening. Congratulations, and I’m curious how you look back at awards of any kind, specifically, the two nominations and now the first Oscar win. In terms of a measure of a career, because it’s, obviously, not the reason you do things, but what kind of dessert topping does it put on a distinguished career?

A. That’s absolutely a wonderful phrase. It is a le creme on top, and it’s lovely to be sort of accepted, because you know that beyond the pleasure of working in front of a live audience, particularly, it’s a general acceptance of your work. So it’s thrilling, and I don’t pretend not to poo poo awards, although there’s so many of them, I can’t keep up. I mean, they’re inventing a new one every day.

Q. Mr. Plummer, congratulations. Congratulations, on your role, it was very charming and lovely. And the Academy has a long history of awarding straight actors for gay roles. Do you think there’s a double standard for the public supporting gay actors in real life as opposed to on film?

A. Well, I think of actors as being universally the same, gay or straight. We’re all actors, and a gay actor can play a straight guy beautifully and vice versa. It’s wonderful, because it cancels out all of the sexual differences and all the sort of preconceived misunderstandings of a sexual existence.

Q. Hello, Mr. Plummer, congratulations. I just wanted to ask you, for you, is this a beginning for you tonight and what do you think it’s the beginning of?

A. Well, it is sort of a renewal, it’s not a beginning exactly, but it has recharged me and I hope I can do it for another ten years at least. I’m going to drop dead wherever I am, on stage or on the set. We don’t retire in our profession, thank God.

Q. You always do a good job. In your long and illustrious career, who stands out as your favorite actor besides yourself? Who did you look up to?

A. No, not myself. Tons of actors for different reasons. In the French cinema we had when I grew up, I saw a lot of French film, because I lived in Quebec from France, great actors and Pierre Brasseur, Lewis Gilbert, and people who are just extraordinary stage actors, particularly although they did do film. And the great classical actors that inspired me when I was quite young [inaudible], and then later the whole new school of Marlon Brando. I lived through all of those various changes, and they all had their made their mark upon me, thanks.

Q. I’m so excited. I see you’re wearing your Order of Canada pin. I wanted to know why you decided to wear that tonight?

A. I do because I sort of feel that I’m in a way representing my country here tonight, just as Max was representing Sweden. And I feel that my country gave me the highest this is the highest civil honor that a Canadian can get and I’m very proud of it and I think an evening like this deserves to have all the medals and awards showing, so that’s why I did it.

Q. You were born in 1929?

A. Yes.

Q. The same year as the Oscar?

A. Yes.

Q. And you won the award for being an old man, at the age of 70. So I wondered if it mattered to have a naked man in your own hands. Are you brave enough to say that you love him?

A. The question is I’m sorry do I love the Oscar?

Q. Yeah.

A. Well, if the Oscar is gay, yes, of course.

Q. Just another Canadian question.

A. Oh, God.

Q. Can you bring back anything during the war, growing up during the war that gave you so much strength? Canada is so much a part of your life and it was such a strength, you know, [inaudible].

A. Yeah, it was great to grow up in Quebec, particularly, because Quebec never closed.  Montreal stayed open 24 hours a day, even jaded New Yorkers would come up and enjoy the night life in Montreal. I’m glad I grew up in a really racy town, and it was marvelous and the cabaret was so important. Piaf, Chevalier, we had a young Julie Garland, Frank Sinatra, and you can see these people for nothing, just sitting at a bar and having a beer.  It was a glorious time in Montreal and I was lucky enough to be there. The courage that you talk about was from my mother who was in the first Great War as a nurse, and anything that she lived through a pretty horrific time. I don’t know if that’s funny to some of you. Oh, there’s two things going on here, all right. Does that answer your question a little bit?

Image Courtesy of  Richard Harbaugh / ©A.M.P.A.S.

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The film ‘Hugo’ has proven technically strong at this year’s Academy Award ceremony, winning over other technically visionary films without problems. Tom Fleischman and John Midgley won for their work in Sound Mixing and afterwards, the Oscar press corps had a chat with the two happy first-time winners.

Tom Fleischman: Wow, this is an incredible honor. Thanks to the Academy; thanks to Graham King and Tim Headington for producing “Hugo”; many thanks to my fellow nominees who inspire me and you do inspire me for years; Marty and Thelma, what a joy and privilege it’s been to work with you; and my wife Priscilla for her unending love and support. Everyone back in New York at Soundtrack and C5. Thank you to Dede Allen and Dick Vorisek, you couldn’t be here tonight but I know you are both smiling.

John Midgley: This is such an honor, thank you so much. Thank you to my crew, Mike and Charlotte, and thank you so much to Martin Scorsese. Thank you.

Q. It’s your first win. Just tell us how you’re feeling right now and what it means to you.

A. (Eugine Gearty) We’re feeling pretty darn good, I’d say.  It means a lot to us to be here. Pretty great.

A. (Philip Stockton) Absolute honor.

Q. So, Hugo just won for visual effects as well?

A. (Eugine Gearty) Yes.

Q. So, do you think this reflects, perhaps, the Academy’s embracing of the whole ethos of silent cinema and everything that Hugo kind of represented?

A. (Philip Stockton) In a word, yes. I mean, obviously, a lot of technical skills went into this. I’m actually a little disappointed that there weren’t any actor and actress nominations for this. Obviously it was a technical masterpiece to pull off. Obviously, the tech award to have that recognized makes a lot of sense.

Q. Hi guys, I’m wondering if while you’re making the movie, are you able to look at each other at some point and say, you know, this is really good, I mean, we might win an Oscar for this. Is that something that goes through your mind?

A. (Eugine Gearty) Yes, that definitely has gone through our mind.  When you work for Martin Scorsese, there’s always a chance you’re going to be nominated for an Oscar. So, yes [inaudible].

A. (Philip Stockton) I think we would have been nominated for ‘Shutter Island’ if it came out in the right year.

Q. Scorsese films have a distinct sound to them, especially with soundtracks, The Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, especially ‘Goodfellas’ and ‘Casino’. Given that legacy, what was the challenge here and did you fight that trend or what how did it work as a sound editor knowing how rich his music is in his prior films?

A. (Eugine Gearty) We actually worked on all of those films, so we I guess we just had to sort of

A. (Philip Stockton) Yeah, it’s actually a really good question. It’s incredibly difficult to work with the situation where Marty is very the most important thing is dialogue, the narration and then the soundtrack, as is music. And rightfully so. When you the films you mentioned have great soundtracks, rock and roll and everything. What was great on this was Howard Shore’s score was such a masterpiece and we were very fortunate to be able to work early on together and it intertwined. Forgive me, but I think there were only two source cues on this film as opposed to the films you mentioned that have a lot more source cues.

After winning the Oscar for Best Cinematography, Robert Richardson also spoke to the waiting Oscar press corps.

Q. You did make a comment on stage about the cinematography award being first. Were you serious? Is that something that’s bothering you or do you have strong feelings about that?

A. No. It’s a fear factor. Yeah, of course. Cinematography. We are behind the lens. We are not in front of the lens. So, it made it a little complex for me to walk up there.

Q. So, what was it like for you DP’ing on Scorsese film that’s every bit as much rendering green screen as it is actually staged?

A. Oh, I don’t know if you are absolutely accurate on that part. There was not as much green screen as there was on the production side. Once you get Dante here, I think that’s conversation you should have with him. He might not take well to that one. It was a great deal of practical. The sets were phenomenal. So, I am not appropriate for that one.

Q. All right. I’m wondering if you can talk about working in 3D. This is not the first 3D film to win, but it’s unusual to get recognized with 3D.

A. You’re right. I think the odds of winning are extraordinarily small. I was the crystal ball didn’t work this way. I know it worked that way for Mark Wahlberg, but for me, I didn’t see it. I don’t know [unintelligible] a Mark Wahlberg piece, but his predictions are near two for three. Uhm, yeah, I know it’s very difficult to choose 3D, and I’m surprised by it as well.  And I think it’s not just 3D. It’s a digital aspect versus a film aspect.

Q. Where do we go now, dramatically, with 3D now that you’ve paved the way?

A. That’s a huge question, but I don’t think there’s any limits for it. 3D is a very solid step.  I believe it’s 15, 20 percent, give an arbitrary percentage. The advantage is a tool towards what filmmakers can use, if used, as just that, as a tool, not as a gimmick. There’s an end. I do believe it will alter that, but, technically, I don’t believe we can go into that here, ’cause I could go on for an hour [inaudible].

Q. This is the last year of Kodak sponsoring the venue for the Oscars. Can you talk about shooting digital versus shooting film?

A. Last night, I was at the Kodak dinner at The Bistro. And, of course, it’s a bit painful. I’m shooting currently on film. Uhm, I’m with Quentin Tarantino for ‘Django Unchained’. I don’t think it’s an issue of film versus digital. I’m hoping that film can survive for as long as possible. I hope Kodak sticks here, but it’s not over yet, virtually, every film, is digitized in one way or another, so we have to think about that. The digital media sweep.

Q. I’m curious with such a prominent group of cinematographers that you were nominated with, how does it feel for you now that you were the one that was called and won the Oscar?

A. I’m elated. I didn’t see this as happening. I have to say, personally, I love the work of Chivo in ‘The Tree of Life’. I, also, think he’s well overdue, but that said, I am extraordinarily happy. I do love that man, so, I would like to see that not too far in the future. Thank you all very much.

Image Courtesy of  Rick Salyer / ©A.M.P.A.S.

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Mark Bridges took home the award for Best Costume Design at the 84th Academy Awards. ‘The Artist’ is one of this year’s most highly acclaimed films, and the black and white silent movie have surprised movie goers and critics alike with its charm and passion. Bridges thankfully accepted the award and afterwards spoke with the Oscar press corps about the wonderful honor:

Wow, this is thrilling. I want to thank Michel Hazanavicius for making a beautiful film and having me along for the ride, Thomas Langmann for believing in the film and getting the resources together to make it, and Harvey Weinstein and The Weinstein Company for getting it out to the world. I want to thank my wonderful crew and you know, I was just a kid from Niagara Falls who dreamed, ate, and slept movies and so I want to thank the Academy for this honor and for making a lifelong dream come true. Thank you.

Q. Congratulations. What classic Hollywood films in terms of the visual style of the wardrobe, et cetera, specifically what films inspired what you created for The Artist?

A. There’s a great film called ‘Show People’ starring Marion Davies, which was all shot on the back lot of MGM at the end of the ’20s. Great research. We also watched things like ‘It’, ‘Our Dancing Daughters’, ‘City Girl’, ‘Sunrise’, those were sort of emotional touch spots for touchstones for us. So things like that. Not not a lot, but enough to get the flavor and know how things were worn.

Q. Yes, hello. Can you speak to the difficulties of having costumes that were going to be shot in black and white versus color?

A. Well, we actually filmed it in color because there was a chance that the film would at some markets be shown in color.  Luckily, we were able to finally prevail with it in black and white.  You know, it really comes down to different values and I was very concerned about the graphics, whether the actors would separate from the backgrounds that they’re standing in front of. So and once we got the textures down, we knew textures read beautifully, I could tell a story with textures.

Q. We spoke the other night at the Costume Designers Guild. Congratulations. I’m curious, how do you feel tonight after winning the Oscar?

A. I’m very excited as you can imagine. It hasn’t quite sunk in because we’ve just been led from one thing to another, but I’m thrilled; I’m very proud, I’m so happy.  And as I said in my speech, it really is a lifelong dream come true. I spent a great deal of my childhood where the winters are long and movies are a great escape and it has affected me for my whole life and career choice. And I think it’s amazing that I was given the opportunity to do a movie that is a love letter to Hollywood.

Q. You said that you made the costumes larger in the beginning. Was Jean larger in the beginning?

A. No. What I think what Michel said was, you know, once the character George has his fall, he wanted the costumes just a little bigger to reflect that somehow George is less of a man than he was. And so we did that, hopefully, subtly through the tailoring.

Q. Is Jean as great a guy as we think he is?

A. Yes, and then some. He’s an extraordinary person, yes.

Image Courtesy of  The Weinstein Company

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Martin Scorcese’s magical tale of the orphan Hugo who tries to make sense of his father’s death is currently sweeping the stakes at the 84th Academy Awards. Below are the speech of the winners so far.

Winner in Cinematography: Robert Richardson

I can’t believe somebody put cinematography up first because it can only go up from this point. I want to thank you all. Marty, you’re a genius as usual and Graham, sticking in there all the way. I’d love to thank Ian, Chris, Gregor, Kanchan, Maya, Beauty, you’re all my family. And to all the past, future and present filmmakers, this is for you.

Winner in Art Direction: Dante Ferretti and Francesca Lo Schiavo

Dante Ferretti: Thank you to the Academy for this prestigious award. A great thank you goes to the producer Graham King and Tim Headington, to all my art department, but the most of all my very special thank you to a eccezionale director who guide us though this wonderful journey: Martin Scorsese. Thank you, thank you, thank you very much. Grazie, Martin.

Francesca Lo Schiavo: This is for Martin and for Italy.

Backstage, Ferretti and Schiavo answered a few questions to the Oscar news corps.

A. (Dante Ferretti) Today is my birthday and I think this is the most incredible gift I’ve ever been given.

A. (Francesca Lo Schiavo) Happy birthday, Dante.

Q. I was taken to task by Robert Richardson for the simple question that given your track record of working with Scorcese, what was different working in this film, obviously except for the fact there was such a larger component of green screen digitally involved compared to your past movie. How did that make it different?

A. I did eight movies so far with Martin and this is the first time that not only for me but for everybody who worked on this film, for Martin, for Bob Richardson, for everybody. And it was also when we started the movie the movie was supposed to be in normal 2D, but then they decided to do it in 3D. And then we started we did many research with it and we understood to do it in 3D, we have to take more attention for all the detail, for everything, for foreground, for more depth. So anyway, it’s like now, we are in 3D, you work in the middle of the 3D, you see people in front and behind and the end, on the back. So it’s good. I think the work is good enough to be exaggerated. It has to be what I think in HUGO, what Marty did and Marty and Bob Richardson. When you sit in theater, you are, like, inside the screen. This is what I feel, what I saw. This is it.

Q. When you were on stage you mentioned the fact that this was for Italy, and I was wondering for you, do you feel like this award is for your country?

A. (Francesca Lo Schiavo) Yeah.

Q. When did you decide that this profession was for you?  What made you decide?

A. (Francesca Lo Schiavo) Listen, I decide many, many, many years ago and of course I was in Italy, and I was so deeply interested about the decoration and I work in interior design studios, and then, I mean, at the same time I love so much movies. So when I understood that it was possible to do both, I mean, the decoration, movies, so that was the start for of my job, to make decisions about to do this job.

Q. Dante, Francesca, congratulations. This is your third nomination for your third Oscar. What has changed? The nominations are the same year after year, you keep winning everything, you keep doing incredible good work. What does it change in your work and also approach to your winning another Oscar?

A. (Dante Ferretti) Nothing changed, actually. Tomorrow morning I have to wake up very early, I have to go back to work and anyway, it’s good. For me it doesn’t change because this is something important for your work, but for me every time I start a new film it’s like my first one. So for this, when the people ask me when do you go on vacation, for me, I go on vacation when I start a new movie, and this feels very important for me.

Q. And you, Francesca?

A. (Francesca Lo Schiavo) For me, it doesn’t change anything because because just, I mean, I have more enthusiasm for to keep going, keep going.

Q. Congratulations.

Image Courtesy of  Paramount/Jaap Buitendijk

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Predictions for tonights Supporting category wins point to Octavia Spencer and Christopher Plummer. In the first part, we spoke about the difficulty of determining a supporting performance; screen time, age and experience play a tricky part. Here comes the age concerns.

There is well-documented ageism in the Academy; possibly explained through the idea that experience brings award-winning performances, but continuously disproved since acclaimed performers have gone the majority of their careers (if not all) without the Oscars. Gary Oldman, as an example, just broke his circle this year but notable names without nominations include Errol Flynn, Marylin Monroe and Donald Sutherland. However, the trend is more so in the Leading categories than in the Supporting ones, and interestingly enough, also more so for men than women.

To take an example, the youngest winner for Leading Actor was Adrian Brody, age 29, for ‘The Pianist‘. The youngest winner for Supporting Actor was Timothy Hutton, age 20, for ‘Ordinary People’. For actresses it was Marlee Matlin, age 21, winning Leading Actress for ‘Children of a Lesser God’ and Tatum O’Neal, age 10, winning Supporting Actress for ‘Paper Moon’. There is a significant discrepancy between the two categories, and sexes, to suggest that it’s easier to be recognized by the Academy as a young supporting performer than as a lead performer.

When looking strictly at nominations, the age range in the top 10 of youngest actors range from 9 years of age to 27 for the top listed in a leading performance, youngest nominee being Jackie Cooper. But for Supporting Actor, the range is noticeably smaller, with Justin Henry receiving a nomination at age 8 for ‘Kramer vs. Kramer‘ and the age of the top 10 only ranging between 8 and 10. That’s 18 years difference for youngest leading actor and just 2 years for the supporting actor. For the women, it’s nine years difference in the top 10 youngest lead actresses and 4 years for supporting actresses.

The ageism thus applies most to the Leading male category.

It may be a little contrived to break down Academy statistics to determine pattern, but it is obvious that an undefined but recurring set of rules apply for the supporting categories; almost anything goes in terms of screen time and age and in the eyes of a hardcore cynic, the supporting nominations are a motley mix of scene-stealing performances and foundlings which the Academy feel uncomfortable placing anywhere else.

Why was Zach Galifianakis not nominated then?

Maybe some divine truth completely alluded me, but even if I enjoyed myself tremendously watching Kristen Wiig give the bridal party acute diarrhea, I am having a really tough time swallowing that an obscene performance, including pooping in a sink, is Oscar worthy. I see the arguments for it; how refreshing it is to have the Academy come down from their high-brow chair and throw a bone to a fart joke. But does that make you respect the Academy more?

Over and over again, I was coaxed to not miss ‘Bridesmaids‘ because “it’s like The Hangover, but for chicks.” And it truly is; a tale of the battle that friends of the bride — or groom — have to go through. So why was Zach Galifianakis not nominated? Melissa McCarthy is in all her glorious being, basically playing his female counterpart; socially awkward tag-along from the weird side of the family. She mysteriously got the nod, but like Bérénice Bejo, she will not win.

Finally, the nomination of Jonah Hill. His performance in Moneyball was to me flat and bewildered. The whole movie eluded me for meaning and purpose and the nomination of Hill seems to be the annual ‘funny guys does a serious role; shocking! Oscar!’ -case.

The Academy left out an incredible performance by Albert Brooks over Hill? Every ‘The Sitter’ movie he will make for the rest of his life will be “starring oscar nominee Jonah Hill.” Academy, look what you’ve done.

The show is only minutes from starting and we will know the outcome by the end of the night. Winners have already been selected, but no matter what, I hope the people you have rooted for will win.

Image Courtesy of Todd Wawrychuk / ©A.M.P.A.S.

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Of the main categories on the nomination list for the Academy Awards, I find that the supporting role nods offer the most confusion; a lot of contention always arise as the supporting characters can vary greatly in age, screen time and seriousness.

This years nominations have left me with two sore points; Jonah Hill for ‘Moneyball’ and Melissa McCarthy for last years hilarious ‘Bridesmaids’. But I’ll get back to those.

First of all, let us talk about those who were left out. The greatest surprise was the horrendous omission of Albert Brooks. In the run-up to the nomination announcement, it was predicted to be a split battle between Christopher Plummer for ‘Beginners’ and Brooks for the acclaimed ‘Drive’. The award showers in the run-up had pointed to this situation, even to Brooks as the possible winner this year, so for him to not even get a shot at the target was shocking. Fans were baffled over the final decision but Reuters could report that the man in question took the bad news in good humor, tweeting shortly after the announcement: “I got ROBBED. I don’t mean the Oscars, I mean literally. My pants and shoes have been stolen,” and later put a candid twist on Sally Fields notorious 1985 acceptance speech: “And to the Academy: “You don’t like me. You really don’t like me.”

Brooks was not the only snub; Shailene Woodly, who plays George Clooney’s daughter in The Descendants, was mentioned as a prime candidate, as well as the scene-stealing Patton Oswalt for the bittersweet comedy ‘Young Adults’. That Young Adults was left out completely is a whole other crime in itself.

There are of course the nods who came about despite an averagely performing package. Some speak against Janet McTeer and her role in the drama ‘Albert Nobbs’, saying she got the nomination at the expense of Woodly. One IMDB.com user went as far as to say “To me, McTeer completely overacted her part. [...] Contorting the face to look “manly” is one of the most simplistic and poorest forms of acting I can envision.” But in for those in favor; McTeer was subtle and endearing in her portrayal that reflects a unique situation – no one could even imagine that a woman would dress up as a man in 19th century Ireland. Both her and Glenn Close (who is also nominated) are meant to be women, pretending to be men. Not actual men. McTeer was on all accounts a scene-stealer, like Oswalt, and her nomination is if possible, more deserved than Close’s.

Then we have Max von Sydow, who alongside the nominated cast members of ‘The Artist’ makes 2012 the year where a whopping three acting nominations were given without a single word spoken (that is a lie; Jean Dujardin has one line). Much controversy has been dragging behind the 9/11 drama ‘Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close’ for stealing away a nomination for Best Picture despite mixed reviews. But von Sydow is a keeper; in silence he conveyed the delicate highs and devastating lows of contemporary human emotion and though the movie has been labelled an overall misfire (the New York Post called it “emotional blackmail” and the Toronto Star singling it out as ‘calculated Oscar bait’), you can’t deny a performance like that. Not to mention that some actually liked the overall film, thanks to him.

Much ado about nothing?

When the Academy pronounces the nominations, it is given without pattern nor order. Sometimes it feels like the nominations for supporting roles are made in an equally disorderly manner. The field is incredibly obscure and you ask yourself; on what basis is it decided what constitutes a worthy supporting part?

The first contention is screen time. A look back at the Oscar records show that screen time is no hindrance when it comes to dazzling the Academy. The shortest-ever winning performance for an Actor in a supporting role was Anthony Quinn for ‘Lust for Life’ in 1955, only dominating the screen for a mere eight minutes. Shortest Supporting Actress performance was won by Beatrice Straight in 1976 for a meager 5 minutes and 40 seconds. Judi Dench is another example when she won in 1998 for her eight minutes work in ‘Shakespeare in Love’.

In comparison, the shortest Best Actor performance to win was David Niven’s 15 minutes and 38 seconds in ‘Seperate Tables’. Next to him is Anthony Hopkins for 16 minutes in ‘The Silence of the Lambs’.

Clearly, time is not the greatest obstacle. Supporting parts are simply tough to evaluate because they usually do the background work that lifts everything else. And it varies how talented or important that lift is. Scene-stealers are naturally favored, but the Academy has an equally recurring tendency of nominating a main character as a Supporting performance if they ‘don’t really know where to put them’, e.g. they are reluctant to recognize a performance in the more significant Leading category.

This year our first question is why Bérénice Bejo was nominated in the Supporting category by the Academy — but as a Leading actress at the BAFTA awards. What constitutes a lead performance over a supporting one? Can there only be one main character? This is not the first time that the Academy makes these types of calculated mistakes and it’s a shame because a lead character being categorized with supporting characters will either rob them of their due diligence or destroy their chance of winning because the voters will be distracted by the misplacement. Bejo will not win this year.

Read the continuation of this debate here.

Image Courtesy of  ©Douglas Kirkland 2012

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Tonight at the newly renamed Hollywood and Highland Center, the Academy Awards will be delivering Oscar magic all night under the auspice of returning host Billy Crystal. The silent triumph of ‘The Artist’ is leading the buzz at the moment but until the cameras turn on inside the dazzling auditorium, the bets are on.

This year marks the 84th time around that Hollywood’s finest gather to celebrate the last years cinematic triumphs, but there has rarely been so much debacle before the big night; after years of faithful audiences, the ABC network reports a drop in recent years from a steady 60 to 70 million viewers to a mere 40 millions. In comparison, the Super Bowl finals could draw more than 110 millions viewers.

Another issue was the departure of producer Brett Ratner who left along with this years initially announced host, Eddie Murphy – not to mention the sudden and unfortunate bankruptcy of Eastman Kodak which brought on a complicated naming and promotional issue and jeopardizes the Academy’s continuous use of the facility for the Oscar show.

The biggest problem, though, is the dwindling number of viewers. Why have movie lovers forsaken the prestigious ceremony?

Some believe the major issue is that the general audience never really watches the movies that end up being celebrated by the contemporary Academy. In the last decade, the selected nominees have increasingly been influenced by art, emotions and indie productions; only few box office hits seem to cut it when it comes to Best Picture or leading performances – James Cameron’s ‘Avatar’ being a notable exception.

The movies at this years Oscars are haunted by slow performances at the box office – The Artist, despite formidable reviews, only managed to make 28 million dollars, in comparison with ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2’ which raked a whopping 1,3 billion dollars last year.

As the general public see less and less of the nominated movies, their interest and excitement in the competition at the Oscar slumps. There is no fun in watching the celebration of movies you never heard of.

To compensate for the low level of recognizable names on the nomination list, the Academy have attempted to boost the entertainment quality of the event itself, including younger hosts, more comedy and more glamour. Last year’s double hosting by the sweet Anne Hathaway and spaced out James Franco was one of the low points of these initiatives so the return of Billy Crystal in a welcomed treat for Oscar buffs. Tonight makes his ninth time as Oscar host and the 63 year-old holds a great record as a terrific entertainer.

Despite the Academy’s struggle to get things in place for the night of the golden statue, millions of people worldwide will tune in tonight for the exquisite pleasure of watching the finest of Hollywood, gather in a media production extravaganza, including an ambitious slated performance of Cirque du Soleil in a one-time-only event by a rumored more than 50 performers, their biggest troupe ever.

Billy, we’re ready for you!

Image Courtesy of  Bob D’Amico / ABC

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‘The Descendants‘, George Clooney’s latest movie, tells the story of Matt King (George Clooney), who is living in Hawaii with his wife and two daughters. His wife suffers a massive head injuries during a boating accident and falls into a deep coma. Matt has always been busy with his job and his travelling so he decides to stay with his daughters and tries to protect them from their common tragedy. Meanwhile, Matt discovers the real truth about his wife; that she has been having an affair with a real estate guru. Alongside his daughters, Matt must learn how to deal with his wife’s infidelity, his life, and the meaning of family. The movie is a blend of comedy and serious emotion that will make any heart bleed if it has ever gone through an unexpected personal trauma.

The Descendants has been nominated for some of the main Oscar awards this year; looking at Best Picture, Best Director (Alexander Payne), Best Actor (Clooney), Best Adapted Screenplay (Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon and Jim Rash), and Best Editing (Kevin Tent).

The rest of the field for Best Picture is mirrored by different facets of cinema: “Hugo”; “The Artist”; “Midnight in Paris”; “The Help”; “Moneyball”; all have their stronger and weaker points. But the question is: Are the cinematic triumph of The Descendants strong enough to secure any of the five awards it has been nominated for?

George Clooney’s fans and critics believe that his performance is in a league of its own: “Clooney’s performance as Matt may be the best of his career,” says Phil Wallace of Picktainment.com. This seems to be true because he was capable of conveying to the audience the pain, the suffering and the strength of a husband and father who is thrown into the truth about his life. Clooney has never taken on a character like this before. Even thought Matt is vulnerable, a powerless father and a widower, Clooney shows that even a character like this is within his reach as an actor.

This year’s nominations are dominated by Michel Hazanavicius’s ‘The Artist‘, with 10 nominations, and Martin Scorsese’s ‘Hugo‘ with 11 nominations, giving The Descendants tough competition for the win. Although The Descendants may not sweep the winning table, no one can deny Clooney’s hard work and Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon and Jim Rush efforts with their screenplay, which may land them  the award for Best Adapted Screenplay.

Image Courtesy © Douglas Kirkland 2012

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