The 2021 inductees to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame have been announced: Tina Turner, Carole King, The Go-Go’s, JAY-Z, Foo Fighters and Todd Rundgren. Tina Turner is now the second woman, after Stevie Nicks, to be inducted twice (she was inducted with ex-husband Ike in 1991). The Go-Go’s, after fifteen years of eligibility, were finally nominated for the first time this year, and I’m elated they were inducted on their first try. I refuse to believe it’s been twenty-five years since the first Foo Fighters album, because that would make me old.
According to Deadline, Tom Cruise has delivered his three Golden Globe awards (Best Actor in a Drama for Born on the Fourth of July and Jerry Maguire, and Best Supporting Actor for Magnolia) to the Hollywood Foreign Press Association amidst an ongoing conflict surrounding the HFPA’s lack of diversity. I have a hard time taking Cruise seriously anyway due to his slavish devotion to the cult of Scientology, but this sort of performative nonsense will do nothing to affect change.
Are You Experienced by The Jimi Hendrix Experience was released on this day in 1967. One of the best and most influential debut albums of all time, Are You Experienced is stacked with one banger after another, including “Purple Haze”, “Fire”, “Hey Joe”, “Manic Depression” and “May This Be Love”, a personal favorite of mine.
On this day in 1994, Pulp Fiction premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, and cinema would never be the same.
On this date in 1988, a musical production of Carrie opened at the Virginia Theatre in New York City. Yes, you read that right – Carrie, the musical. Considered one of the biggest flops in Broadway history, Carrie had some top notch talent, including songs by Dean Pitchford and Michael Gore, the Oscar-winning songwriting duo from Fame. Betty Buckley, one of the greatest musical theater performers ever and cast member of the 1976 film (she played the gym teacher, Miss Collins), starred as Margaret White. A 2012 off-Broadway revival yielded a cast recording, and you can listen to it here.
Entertainment Weekly has kicked off a summer-long series called “I Want My Teen TV” with a list of the fifty best teen shows of all time. I’m happy to see a few of my personal favorites, including Square Pegs, Party of Five and Felicity, on the list, but I take issue with them placing the sublime Freaks and Geeks at #5 – BEHIND Beverly Hills, 90210.
On this day in 1958, Hammer Horror films released Dracula (titled Horror of Dracula in the US to avoid confusion with the 1931 Bela Legosi film). Christopher Lee’s Dracula was brooding and sensual, and was the first to incorporate many of the characteristics of the character as we know him today, including fangs and red contact lenses. Hammer would produce eight sequels to the film, six of which featured Lee in the titular role.
The folks at Stranger Things released a season 4 teaser this week. I’ve already watched it half a dozen times, poring over every detail in hopes of finding clues. There is no indication of a release date, unfortunately, so I guess we’ll have to wait a little longer for that information.
David Keith and Stephen Furst were both born on this day in 1954. Best known as Kent “Flounder” Dorfman in National Lampoon’s Animal House, Furst also appeared on St. Elsewhere and Babylon 5, and did a lot of voice work for animation as well. Furst died in 2017 of diabetes-related complications. Keith is perhaps best known for playing Sid Worley in An Officer and a Gentleman; he was nominated for a Golden Globe for his heartbreaking performance, but lost to co-star Louis Gossett Jr. (who would go on to win the Oscar as well). My favorite Keith performance is Andrew McGee, the father of pyrokinetic Charlie McGee (Drew Barrymore), in 1984’s Firestarter. The father-daughter relationship is authentic and poignant, and provides a lovely contrast to the horror elements of the film.
Twitter helpfully reminded me this week of the existence of Tom Holland’s Lip Sync Battle performance of “Singin’ in the Rain/Umbrella”. I’ve watched this video approximately one gazillion times, and it never fails to bring a smile to my face.
On this day in 1970, The Beatles released their twelfth and final studio album, Let It Be (along with the film of the same name). The sessions were fraught with tension, and the album was reviewed unfavorably, despite the presence of some of the band’s most famous compositions, including the title track, “Get Back” and “The Long and Winding Road”. The album includes two of my personal favorites, “Across the Universe” and “Two of Us”.
Sebastian Stan and Lily James will star as Tommy Lee and Pamela Anderson in a new Hulu limited series. Their transformation into the iconic duo is astonishing, and they look like they’re having a blast. Pam & Tommy will also star Seth Rogen, Nick Offerman and Taylor Schilling.
Human pile of garbage Elon Musk is hosting SNL tonight. Please, for the sake of all that is good in the world, do not watch, not even to see what a train wreck it will be.
On a new episode of their podcast Office Ladies, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey have revealed that Jan’s sperm donor was none other than tennis player Andy Roddick. Apparently, Roddick is good friends with Rainn Wilson, and would often visit the set. A scene was filmed for season four finale “Goodbye Toby” in which Jan tells Michael about Roddick being her baby daddy, but it was cut from the episode.
Infertility sucks. Obviously, the emotions are infinitely more nuanced than that, but that’s the gist of it. Many people struggle with infertility; an estimated 10-15% of married couples are infertile. Infertility testing is invasive, and treatments are expensive. The stress of the process is intense; relationships have been known to crumble under the weight of it. In a lot of cases, the desperately wanted child never arrives.
My personal journey began in 2005, when I finally married for the first time at the age of “well into my thirties”. Knowing we had already gotten a late start, but wanting to enjoy being together without any pressure, we didn’t really try but we didn’t really not try (as my hubby used to tell people, “We’re having fun practicing”). Our situation was exacerbated by my father-in-law’s illness and death, about a year and a half into our marriage. My husband’s grief was profound, and baby-making fell to the back burner. Once we got back to trying, it quickly became apparent that it probably wasn’t going to happen. Then, at the age of forty, I started having increasingly painful and more frequent periods. My primary care provider ordered an ultrasound. The diagnosis? Fibroids AND endometriosis.
I’d always wanted kids. There was no question in my mind. I hadn’t imagined the possibility that I wouldn’t be able to have them. And even though I was forty and still not pregnant, I was somehow thoroughly unprepared for the news that I needed to have a hysterectomy. The specialist I’d gone to see after my ultrasound, who would eventually perform the surgery, didn’t know my situation, and when I burst into tears, she asked me, “Why are you crying?” I felt a complicated myriad of emotions that I couldn’t really explain. I thought I’d already made my peace with it, but the news was like a door slamming in my face. My choices had been taken away from me. I had become a member of a club to which I hadn’t requested enrollment.
In the months and years following my surgery, I continued to feel this complex stew of emotions; a pinch of anger, a dash of guilt, heaps and heaps of heartache. The anguish seemed bottomless, and triggers were often unexpected. I was at the salon one day, and the woman in the chair next to me was talking about her grandkids and I welled up; I had spent so much time mourning the fact that I didn’t get to have kids that I had completely overlooked the fact that I wouldn’t get to have grandkids. I envied people who easily became pregnant, then felt remorseful for my envy.
Infertility stories in pop culture, especially when done well, became one of the easiest ways to trigger my grief. A couple of the entries on this list made me cry violent, irrepressible tears. But there’s also some comfort to be found in knowing that other people can identify with how you’re feeling; that’s a benefit to being a member of the club. I don’t know how many of these stories represented the real lives of their creators, but I thank them for making me feel seen.
“Symphony of Illumination” – How I Met Your Mother
From the beginning of the series, Robin is pretty adamant that she doesn’t want kids. When her period is late, she takes a pregnancy test and it’s positive (Barney would have been the dad); however, a follow-up visit to the doctor reveals that not only is she not pregnant, but she’ll never be able to get pregnant. Watching Robin run through the gamut of complicated emotions (about a year after my hysterectomy) was gut-wrenching for me; I was wholly unprepared for it, which made it even worse. Stoic-to-a-fault Robin decides not to share the news with her friends, but Ted knows something is wrong and, since Ted never does anything halfway, he attempts to cheer Robin up with a Christmas light show set to AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell”. Does it work? Results are mixed. Robin is baffled by how upset she is to lose something she thought she never wanted, but she appreciates Ted’s gesture. By the time Robin says “If you want to know the truth of it, I’m glad you guys aren’t real” to the kids she’s been narrating her story to, I’m sobbing uncontrollably. Cobie Smulders’ performance in this standout episode is exceptional, and it breaks my heart every time.
Monica and Chandler – Friends
Unlike Robin’s infertility story, which only lasted for one episode of HIMYM, Monica and Chandler’s baby journey lasted multiple seasons, culminating in the birth of their adoptive twins Erica and Jack in the series finale. It all begins in “The One Where Rachel Has a Baby”, the season eight finale; the gang are waiting at the hospital for the arrival of Emma, and Monica and Chandler decide they’re ready to start trying. Immediately. So they have sex in the janitor’s closet. And Monica’s dad accidentally walks in on them. Serious question: do things like this happen in real life, or just in sitcoms? I mean, I can’t imagine having sex in a janitor’s closet, but that doesn’t mean it never happens. I digress.
In season nine, Monica and Chandler are trying in earnest; Monica is tracking her ovulation cycle and scheduling sex, in true Monica fashion. After about a year of trying, they decide to go for fertility testing, and learn they both have fertility issues. After a brief flirtation with surrogacy (and a super awkward dinner with Chandler’s co-worker, played by John Stamos), they decide to adopt. They are chosen by Erica, a pregnant teen in Ohio played by the darling Anna Faris. Erica is sweet and lovely, but let’s just say…naïve. She’s not sure which of two men fathered her baby, but it turns out, the way she had sex with the second man, well…you can’t get pregnant doing it.
Of course, this being a long-running, beloved sitcom, Erica goes into labor in the series finale, and Monica and Chandler are in for one last hilarious shocker – Erica was pregnant with twins and no one had told them.
Since the series ended with the babies coming home, we didn’t get to watch Monica and Chandler, in Rachel’s words, “attempt to handle this”. It could’ve been fun. By the way, I just figured out that the twins would be 17 and Emma would be 19, and now I feel really fucking old.
What made Monica’s story all the more poignant was that her portrayer, Courteney Cox, was struggling with infertility issues of her own before finally getting pregnant with daughter Coco while filming the final season of the show. Monica’s heartbreak comes from a visceral place, and Cox’s performance is by turns heartbreaking and hilarious. It really is a shame that she is the only one of the six primary cast members who was never nominated for an Emmy or Golden Globe for her performance; I guess she just made it look too easy.
Friends ended the year before I got married, so my own infertility journey occurred several years later. Now when I rewatch the show, this storyline obviously impacts me differently than when it first aired. I always empathized with their plight; now, I feel every ounce of their pain.
Vanessa Loring – Juno
Juno is the title character, but Vanessa (Jennifer Garner) is the character I identify with most. Her desire for a baby has consumed her, and when she meets expectant teenage mom Juno (Elliot Page), the time for her to have a child has arrived. Unfortunately, Vanessa’s husband Mark, played by Jason Bateman, is suddenly getting cold feet; he hasn’t accomplished his dream of becoming a rock star (he writes commercial jingles) and isn’t at all sure he’s ready to be a father. The Loring marriage disintegrates in front of Juno’s eyes, but Vanessa makes up her mind to raise the baby on her own. As the movie ends, Cat Power’s exquisite cover of “Sea of Love” plays, Vanessa holds her son for the first time and all seems right with the world.
Carl and Ellie – Up
Those evil bastards at Pixar sure know how to make an adult cry like a baby – Toy Story 3, Finding Nemo and Inside Out, just to name a few – but nothing prepared me for the opening sequence of Up. The wordless montage, set to Michael Giacchino’s phenomenal, Oscar-winning score, is known as “Married Life”, and it tells the love story of Carl and Ellie, who meet as children, fall in love, get married and excitedly await the arrival of their first child. But in a devastating turn of events, Ellie and Carl learn that there will be no baby. I saw Up shortly before I had my hysterectomy, and it gutted me. My heart still aches for Ellie every time I watch this gorgeous, heart-wrenching sequence.
Celia Foote – The Help
The Help is super problematic – the white savior trope is strong with this one, and even Viola Davis has said she wishes she hadn’t done the film. But Celia’s storyline is so poignant, and Jessica Chastain’s performance so moving, that I can almost forgive the film its sins. Celia is new in town, and not like the other women – she grew up dirt poor in Sugar Ditch, Mississippi, and dresses in skin-tight, revealing clothes, much to the chagrin of the Jackson society ladies she so wants to impress (it doesn’t help that her husband Johnny was the high school sweetheart of the film’s grotesquely racist antagonist, Hilly Holbrook). Celia has hired Minnie to cook and clean for her in secret so that Johnny won’t know she lacks those particular domestic skills, but she’s hiding an even bigger secret – she and Johnny got married because she was pregnant, and she lost the baby a month later. Johnny doesn’t know that she’s had three more miscarriages. When we see Celia burying her fetus in a shoebox and planting a rose bush over it – and then the other two rose bushes – it’s a stark visual reminder of Celia’s anguish.
H.I. “Hi” and Edwina (Ed) McDunnough – Raising Arizona
Hi (Nicolas Cage) is an ex-con, and Ed (Holly Hunter) is a former cop. They fall in love and get married, and though they desperately want a baby, Ed’s infertile and they can’t adopt because of Hi’s criminal record. So, they hatch a plan to kidnap one of the “Arizona quints”, the sons of furniture magnate Nathan Arizona, figuring the Arizonas will still have their hands full with four kids. Since this is a Coen brothers film, things quickly spiral out of control; Hi’s boss deduces that their baby is the missing Arizona child and attempts to blackmail him, and Hi’s friends Gale and Evelle (the brilliant John Goodman and William Forsythe) kidnap the baby themselves to keep him safe (they promptly leave him behind at the bank they’ve just robbed). In the end, Hi and Ed decide to return the baby to the Arizonas, and though Nathan discovers them in the act, he sympathizes with their situation and decides not to turn them over to the authorities.
True story: I recently watched Raising Arizona for the first time in many years (and the first time since my hysterectomy) and though I empathized deeply with Hi and Ed, I was also extremely high on cannabis tincture and let me tell you – if you haven’t watched this absurdly hilarious movie while incredibly high, I definitely recommend it.
This brings me to my last point: one of the benefits of not having children is that you can spend a Saturday high while watching Coen brothers movies. Silver linings, people. Silver linings.
Actually, one more thing: if you know someone who doesn’t have kids, please don’t ask them when they’re going to have them. Maybe they don’t plan to, or they haven’t gotten around to it yet, but maybe they aren’t able to. Maybe they’ve tried and tried, and failed to get pregnant. Perhaps they’ve had a miscarriage, or two, or more. No matter how you slice it, it can be a difficult – or even painful – question to answer. Trust me, I speak from experience. And if you know someone struggling with infertility and you’re not sure how to help, just be there for them. You can’t fix it, or take their pain away, but they don’t expect you to. Just listen, and hug, and ask them what they need. And if you’re experiencing infertility – I see you, I feel you and I am so very sorry.
Happy Star Wars day – May the Fourth be with all of you today!
The Mummy, starring the delightful Brendan Fraser, Rachel Weisz and John Hannah, opened on this day in 1999.
Oscar-winning actor, humanitarian and fashion icon Audrey Hepburn was born on this day in 1929.
Today would have been Paul Gleason’s 82nd birthday. Best known as Vice Principal Vernon in The Breakfast Club and LAPD Deputy Chief Dwayne T. Robinson in Die Hard, Gleason made a career of playing tough guys and cops, thanks to his rugged looks and gruff demeanor. He also had a fantastic sense of humor, even reprising his role as Richard Vernon for the 2001 parody flick Not Another Teen Movie.
One of my favorite albums of the 80s, Echo & The Bunnymen’s Ocean Rain, was released on this day in 1984. Featuring the absolutely iconic “The Killing Moon”, “Seven Seas” and “Nocturnal Me” (you may recognize it from the Stranger Things season one episode “The Flea and the Acrobat”), Ocean Rain is lush and atmospheric, and used orchestral arrangements to lend a majestic drama to the proceedings. It’s an album that I still love thirty-some years later.
On this day in 1970, four students at Kent State University in Kent, Ohio, were killed (and another nine injured) by National Guardsmen who’d been called in to quell campus protests of the Vietnam War. The incident inspired Neil Young to write “Ohio”, a quintessential protest song that was recorded by CSNY (along with Stephen Stills’ anti-war song “Find the Cost of Freedom”) and rush-released by Atlantic Records. The single was receiving significant airplay within a few weeks of the shooting.
My husband and I have been thoroughly enjoying HBO’s Mare of Easttown. I see an Emmy Award in Kate Winslet’s future for her portrayal of Mare Sheehan, a police detective whose life and work are, as they say, complicated. Mare is raising her four year old grandchild after the death of her son, her ex-husband is remarrying and the unsolved case of a missing girl haunts her. Now, a teenage mom has been murdered, and Mare is forced to work with a county detective (Evan Peters) to ferret out the killer. The supporting cast is splendid: Jean Smart, Guy Pearce [swoon] and Julianne Nicholson are welcome additions to any cast. The series has already delivered a doozy of a cliffhanger in the second episode (no spoilers here), and I am hooked.
On this day in 1968, Hair opened on Broadway at the Biltmore Theatre (now the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre). Subtitled The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical, Hair was one of the first musicals to incorporate rock music and counter-culture themes – it was explicitly anti-war, and its depiction of drug use and sexuality was quite controversial (as was its racially integrated cast). Hair was nominated for the Tony for Best Musical, and though it lost to 1776, it has left a lasting legacy: a well-regarded film version, directed by Miloš Forman, as well as pop versions of some of the show’s songs (The Fifth Dimension’s “Age of Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In”, The Cowsills’ “Hair” and The Lemonheads’ “Frank Mills”, to name a few). Its influence can still be seen in more contemporary musicals like Rent, Spring Awakening and Next to Normal.
The original Hair cast included a ridiculously young Diane Keaton, far right
On this day in 1961, ABC’s Wide World of Sports debuted. Hosted by the legendary Jim McKay, Wide World of Sports was a Saturday afternoon staple for almost four decades. I was a regular viewer, primarily due to my love of figure skating and gymnastics. Even if you never watched the show, you might be familiar with its iconic opening (“The thrill of victory, and the agony of defeat”):
Alfred Hitchcock died on this day in 1980 of renal failure.
On this day in 1967, Aretha Franklin’s “Respect” was released, and an instant classic was born. I defy you not to sing along:
Happy birthday to Willie Nelson, Nora Dunn, Jerry Seinfeld, Kate Mulgrew, Daniel Day-Lewis, Eve Plumb, Michelle Pfeiffer, Carnie Wilson and Uma Thurman!!
The 93rd Academy Awards were held Sunday night, and it was a relatively subdued affair, which may be appropriate given the circumstances – but it just wasn’t a whole lot of fun to watch. Like I always do, I watched the show while talking on the phone to my best friend/sister-in-law, who lives in Arizona, and we talked over a lot of it, which we don’t usually do. Everything seemed off-kilter somehow; some segments were drawn out, and others, like the In Memoriam, were too rushed (and don’t even get me started on the fact that Adam Schlesinger, a literal Oscar nominee for the That Thing You Do! theme song, WASN’T EVEN INCLUDED).
Regardless of the flaws in the telecast (and despite the record low ratings), it was a great year for movies – even if it wasn’t a great year for moviegoers.
The winners:
There was no one big winner, but Nomadland took home the most awards (three) of the night – Best Picture, Best Director for Chloe Zhao and, in one of the surprises of the evening, Best Actress for Frances McDormand. Five films took home two awards each – The Father (Best Actor – the biggest surprise of the night – and Best Adapted Screenplay), Mank (Best Cinematography and Best Production Design), Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (Best Costume Design and Best Hair & Makeup), Sound of Metal (Best Sound and Best Editing) and Soul (Best Score and Best Animated Feature). Daniel Kaluuya took home Best Supporting Actor for his turn as Fred Hampton in Judas and the Black Messiah and the delightful Yuh-Jung Youn won Best Supporting Actress for Minari. Promising Young Woman‘s writer/director Emerald Fennell won the Best Original Screenplay prize.
Now, about that Best Actor win – Anthony Hopkins, now the oldest person to win an acting Oscar, won for his performance in The Father, but he was not present to accept the award. Because he knew that Chadwick Boseman was expected to posthumously win for Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (and because he’s 83 years old and we’re still in the grip of a global pandemic), Hopkins stayed home in Wales. Even producers banked on a Boseman win, saving the category for last so they could end on a heartwarming note. It was, to say the least, a letdown, but that doesn’t mean Hopkins didn’t deserve the award.
The fashion:
Some of the fashion trends of the evening – cut-outs, gold lame, giant sleeves – didn’t do much for me personally, but what do I know? I live in leggings and t-shirts.
From left, Leslie Odom Jr, Carey Mulligan, Andra Day
From left, Angela Bassett, Amanda Seyfried, Reese Witherspoon
Vanessa Kirby
Rita Moreno
Laura Dern
Zendaya
Margot Robbie
Viola Davis
Regina King
Emerald Fennell
Maria Bakalova
Marlee Matlin
Riz Ahmed and Fatima Farheen Mirza
Hands down my favorite look of the night, little Alan Kim from Minari
This clip is edited, but the standing ovation for Mr. Chaplin lasted for about twelve minutes
Perhaps the funniest Oscar moment of all-time
“That’s just about the only medicine a fella would ever really need”: Wayne died just two months later
It’s even worse than I remembered
Crystal is still my favorite Oscar host of all-time, and this was his best entrance ever
Tom Hanks wins his first Best Actor Oscar – and accidentally outs his high school drama teacher; the speech was the inspiration for In and Out
I’ll never be over how god damn adorable this is
Nominees are expected to lose graciously, but at the 1:15 mark, watch Samuel L. Jackson get real about losing, distinctly saying “shit” as Martin Landau’s name is announced
“ROBERTO!!”
In 2000, Angelina Jolie won Best Supporting Actress, with her brother James as her date…
the siblings are, ahem, quite close
As if the swan dress wasn’t bad enough, Bjork turned it into a piece of performance art and LITERALLY LAID AN EGG ON THE RED CARPET
Ellen Degeneres parodied the moment when she hosted that year’s Emmy Awards
“Stick-man, I see you!”
An historic moment for black women, and there wasn’t a dry eye in the house
Adrian Brody was a surprise Best Actor winner in 2003 – and planted a very non-consensual kiss on Halle Berry (seriously, men – please don’t do this)
Heath Ledger wins a posthumous Oscar for his turn as The Joker in The Dark Knight
Kathryn Bigelow was the first woman to win the Best Director prize – and Barbra Streisand was the perfect person to present the award (tomorrow night, Chloe Zhao will likely become the second woman to win this award)
“Do I look like a new girlfriend?”
In 2013, Daniel Day-Lewis became the only three-time Best Actor winner. He told Dame Helen Mirren that if he won (for his performance in Lincoln), he wanted her to knight him, and Mirren obliged.
MEN – DON’T FUCKING DO THIS (Scarlett deserved her own award for not punching him in the face)
This would be the best selfie ever if only we could erase Kevin Spacey
In the year of #OscarsSoWhite, Chris Rock made Hollywood’s elite squirm in all the right ways
Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty are handed the wrong envelope, and Moonlight‘s spotlight was stolen
So, readers, what are YOUR favorite Oscar moments?
The 93rd Academy Awards will air tomorrow night at 8 pm on ABC.
One of the many ways the pandemic has affected our lives is in how we consume entertainment. I haven’t been to the theater to see a movie since January of 2020 (for the record, it was Star Wars Episode IX – The Rise of Skywalker), and I don’t know when I’ll feel comfortable going to one. I’ve received both doses of the Pfizer vaccine, so theoretically I am fully immune, but I’m still wary of fully rejoining society.
What that means is that if you wanted to see a first-run movie this year, you probably had to do it via streaming. Fortunately, many of the Oscar nominees this year ARE available on one of the major streaming services. The problem is, movies were meant to be seen on a larger screen, and watching them at home just doesn’t do a lot of them justice.
Nevertheless, the Oscars are still on for this year, albeit much later than usual; the pandemic created an alternate timeline for awards season. In another post, I’ll talk about some of my favorite moments from Oscar telecasts past. Here, I’ll focus on some of this year’s nominees (this is not a comprehensive list, but you can find that elsewhere on the internet).
One notable aspect of this year’s nominees: the Oscars are still pretty damn white, but the efforts the Academy has made to boost its membership of non-white males has resulted in the most diverse list of nominees ever.
Best Picture
The Father
Judas and the Black Messiah
Mank
Minari
Nomadland
Promising Young Woman
Sound of Metal
The Trial of the Chicago 7
Mank, starring nominees Gary Oldman and Amanda Seyfried, is the most-nominated film this year with 10 nods
Best Actress nominee Frances McDormand in Nomadland, the overwhelming Best Picture favorite
Best Actress in a Leading Role
Viola Davis – Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
Andra Day – The United States vs Billie Holiday
Vanessa Kirby – Pieces of a Woman
Frances McDormand – Nomadland
Carey Mulligan – Promising Young Woman
Andra Day is The United States vs. Billie Holiday’s sole nominee
Promising Young Woman‘s Carey Mulligan is the odds-on favorite to win Best Actress
On the set of Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom – Viola Davis, director George C. Wolfe and Chadwick Boseman, who looks likely to win the Best Actor award posthumously. Viola Davis is now the most nominated black actress in history, with four career nods.
Best Actor in a Leading Role
Riz Ahmed – Sound of Metal
Chadwick Boseman – Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
Anthony Hopkins – The Father
Gary Oldman – Mank
Steven Yeun – Minari
Sound of Metal‘s Riz Ahmed
The Father, starring nominees Anthony Hopkins and Olivia Colman
Minari‘s Steven Yeun is the first Asian-American Best Actor nominee in history
Best Actress in a Supporting Role
Maria Bakalova – Borat Subsequent Moviefilm
Glenn Close – Hillbilly Elegy
Olivia Colman – The Father
Amanda Seyfried – Mank
Youn Yuh-jung – Minari
Maria Bakalova visited the White House in character for Borat Subsequent Moviefilm
Hillbilly Elegy’s Glenn Close is the 3rd person to be nominated for an Oscar and a Razzie for the same role
Best Actor in a Supporting Role
Sacha Baron Cohen – The Trial of the Chicago 7
Daniel Kaluuya – Judas and the Black Messiah
Leslie Odom Jr – One Night in Miami…
Paul Raci – Sound of Metal
Lakeith Stanfield – Judas and the Black Messiah
Daniel Kaluuya (foreground) and Lakeith Stanfield (far right) in Judas and the Black Messiah. For some reason, both title characters fell into the Supporting Actor category.
Sacha Baron Cohen as Abbie Hoffman in The Trial of the Chicago 7
Leslie Odom Jr. as Sam Cooke in One Night in Miami…
Best Director
Thomas Vinterberg – Another Round
David Fincher – Mank
Lee Isaac Chung – Minari
Chloé Zhao – Nomadland
Emerald Fennell – Promising Young Woman
Mank‘s David Fincher is nominated for his 3rd Best Director Oscar
Emerald Fennell (center, on the set of Promising Young Woman) is one of two women nominated for Best Director – an Oscars first
Chloe Zhao, on the set of Nomadland with Frances McDormand, looks to become only the second woman – and the first woman of color – to win the Best Director Oscar. She is also nominated for writing the screenplay and for editing the film.
Best Writing (Original Screenplay)
Judas and the Black Messiah
Minari
Promising Young Woman
Sound of Metal
The Trial of the Chicago 7
Aaron Sorkin is nominated for his 4th writing Oscar – he won for 2010’s The Social Network
Emerald Fennell is the favorite in this category for Promising Young Woman
Best Writing (Adapted Screenplay)
Borat Subsequent Moviefilm
The Father
Nomadland
One Night in Miami…
The White Tiger
Sacha Baron Cohen is nominated once again for a Borat “screenplay”
Kemp Powers received his first Oscar nomination for One Night in Miami…
Best Animated Feature Film
Onward
Over the Moon
A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon
Soul
Wolfwalkers
Over the Moon
A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon
Pixar’s Soul – the favorite to win
Best International Feature Film
Another Round
Better Days
Collective
The Man Who Sold His Skin
Quo Vadis, Aida?
Another Round, the overwhelming favorite to win Best International Feature Film
Best Music (Original Score)
Da 5 Bloods
Mank
Minari
News of the World
Soul
Trent Reznor, Jon Batiste and Atticus Ross are the favorites to win Best Score for their collaboration on Soul
Terence Blanchard received his second nomination in three years for Da 5 Bloods
Best Music (Original Song)
“Fight for You” – Judas and the Black Messiah
“Hear My Voice” – The Trial of the Chicago 7
“Husavik” – Eurovision Song Contest
“Io Si (Seen)” – The Life Ahead
“Speak Now” – One Night in Miami…
So, readers – who are your favorites to win? And who are you looking forward to seeing on the red carpet?
Helen McCrory died Friday at the age of 52, after a long battle with cancer. Perhaps best known for playing Narcissa Malfoy in the Harry Potter series, she was a formidable theater actress in productions like Macbeth, TwelfthNight, As You Like It and UncleVanya. She also portrayed Clair Dowar in Skyfall and Aunt Polly in Peaky Blinders. She was married to actor Damian Lewis, beloved in my house for his role in Band of Brothers, my husband’s very favorite thing ever. McCrory was originally cast for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, as Bellatrix Lestrange, but was forced to pull out of the project due to pregnancy. She finally made her way into the franchise a few years later, playing Bellatrix’s sister Narcissa.
On this day in 1979, Real People premiered on NBC. The show featured a panel of hosts who introduced segments spotlighting non-celebrity folks who had unique occupations or hobbies. The show was a rare hit for NBC at a time when they were consistently third-place in the ratings (this was before FOX was even a thing, so third-place was last-place). The show spawned a bevy of imitators, the most popular of which was ABC’s That’s Incredible! Fun fact: Real People is responsible for giving Richard Simmons his big break in mass media. Thanks, RealPeople!
Today is Hayley Mills’ 75th birthday. Best known for Disney movies like Pollyanna and The Parent Trap, Mills also starred in the Disney Channel television show Good Morning, Miss Bliss, the rights to which were acquired by NBC; the series was reformatted and retitled Saved by the Bell. Mills is also a stage actress, appearing in productions like Peter Pan and The King and I. The Parent Trap was a favorite of mine growing up, and though the Lindsay Lohan version is charming, I still prefer the Hayley Mills version. And as a side note, I just now figured out that Brian Keith is a hottie in this movie.
*fans self*
Hilarious, charming, beloved Scottish actor David Tennant turns 50 today! Best known as the Tenth Doctor Who (full disclosure: I am not a Doctor Who fan), Tennant has also appeared in series like Broadchurch, Jessica Jones, Des and Good Omens, and films like Fright Night (2011). He also voices Scrooge McDuck, a fact that makes me absurdly happy. Tennant will star as Phileas Fogg in a BBC version of Jules Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days, and I am 100% here for that casting.
First look as Phileas Fogg
On this day in 1996, the revival of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum opened at the St James Theater in New York City. Starring the fabulous Nathan Lane (who won his first of three Tony Awards for his performance), the Sondheim farce ran for 715 performances. A cast recording of this show doesn’t seem to exist on Spotify (you can buy the CD, if you still listen to music that way), but here is the Original Cast Recording, featuring the iconic, also-Tony-winning Zero Mostel.
And finally, the 93rd Academy Awards will air next Sunday. Stay tuned to Peanut Butter and Julie this week for my coverage of this year’s nominees and highlights from past telecasts.
Initially published in 2021, this post has been edited for clarity.
CW: mentions of COVID-19
I’ve always loathed the term “guilty pleasure”. If I enjoy watching/listening to/reading something – and it doesn’t harm anyone else – why should I feel guilty for enjoying it? In the past year, with COVID-19 forcing us to stay at home, entertainment has become an even more critical component of our lives. Some of the media I’ve consumed lately is excellent; my husband and I recently started watching Fargo, and it’s one of the best shows I’ve ever seen. We also thoroughly enjoyed the exceptional Netflix limited series The Queen’s Gambit. But “excellent” isn’t necessarily a prerequisite for enjoying a piece of media. Here are some of my favorite not-so-guilty pleasures.
Xanadu
Growing up in the ’70s, I fell HARD for Olivia Newton-John. She looked like an angel, and she had the voice of one, too. I saw Grease in the theater and loved it, wore out the grooves on the double-album soundtrack (and broke my foot to it, too). So when Xanadu was released, I was 100% the target demographic. Xanadu is a terrible movie, and I adore every moment of it. The plot is preposterous: Newton-John plays Greek muse Kira, who is sent to earth to inspire down-on-his-luck artist Sonny (played by Michael Beck). Sonny, aided by big band leader Danny McGuire (Gene Kelly, in his final film role), decides to open a nightclub named Xanadu. Sonny and Kira naturally fall in love, which is complicated when one of the lovers is, you know, immortal. In the end, the plot is just an excuse to put together a series of gloriously over-the-top musical numbers, set to music from Electric Light Orchestra and Olivia herself (the vastly underrated The Tubes also make an appearance). Xanadu is the height of cheestastic cinema, and I couldn’t love it more.
Why yes, that IS a 67-year-old Gene Kelly on fucking roller skates, why do you ask?
America’s Next Top Model
People often speak of reality television derisively, but like every genre, there is a vast difference in quality from show to show. Series like Survivor, Top Chef, and Project Runway have won Emmys and other awards, and have ranked with the best of television over the past two decades. Then, there’s ANTM. Ostensibly a competition to find, well, America’s next top model, ANTM is really just an excuse to put a bunch of young women together and hope for some drama. The young women ALWAYS deliver (and if they don’t, host Tyra Banks will create some). The truth is, I enjoy the show for the actual modeling, not the gossip and backstabbing. I love the creativity of the photo shoots, like when the models each had to represent one of the seven deadly sins:
Kahlen, the model interpreting wrath (center), found out just before the shoot that a close friend had died. She channeled all her grief into her shoot and came away with the judges’ favorite photo of the week.
Or when they portrayed different types of dolls:
Or when they were circus freaks:
The point is, I’m willing to wade through the drama to get to the artistic segments. But if you watch ANTM (or any other show) just for the drama, you’ll get no judgment from me.
FUN FACT: Cycle 5 contestant Kyle Kavanaugh is from my relatively small Midwestern city, and she literally worked at my hometown Dairy Queen. That’s about as wholesome as it gets.
Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich
We all have our literary guilty pleasures: perhaps yours is the romantic melodrama of Nicholas Sparks, or bodice rippers, or even cocaine-era Stephen King (seriously, The Tommyknockers is batshit insane). Whatever your tastes are, there’s something out there to satisfy them. One of my indulgences is the Stephanie Plum series. Stephanie is, to put it bluntly, a hot mess. At the beginning of the first novel in the series, One for the Money, Stephanie is out of work and has resorted to selling off her belongings to pay the bills. She convinces her cousin Vinny to give her a job at his bail bond business, thinking she’d be a filing clerk, but the only position available is as a bounty hunter. Each book follows the exact same formula: Stephanie gets a case, she screws it up several times before she finally gets it right, and she spends the rest of her time wavering between the two gorgeous men in her life, fellow bounty hunter Ranger and cop (and her high school boyfriend) Joe Morelli. It’s utterly ludicrous, and I love it.
Twister
It’s not that Twister is a BAD movie, it’s just that I love it all out of proportion to its quality. Cinematographer Jan de Bont’s work on films like Die Hard helped him make the leap to directing. Speed, de Bont’s directorial debut, was so wildly successful that he basically received studio carte blanche for his follow-up feature, 1996’s Twister. A $92 million budget allowed de Bont to utilize the most cutting-edge special effects and sound techniques. And that cast! In spite of being hamstrung by a clichéd premise and corny dialogue, the actors are more than game, particularly the members of the supporting cast – Lois Smith elevates everything she’s in, Alan Ruck is a god damn delight as Rabbit (“Rabbit is good, Rabbit is wise”) and the magnificent Philip Seymour Hoffman chews every bit of scenery as storm chaser Dusty.
The Brady Bunch
The Brady Bunch was a Gen-X rite of passage. An idyllic world where an architect can comfortably support a family of nine (let’s face it, Alice was a member of the family) and every problem can be solved before the final commercial break, the Brady family’s existence seemed far removed from the strife of the real world. Never were race riots mentioned in the Brady home, or the seemingly endless war in Vietnam. Once in a while, a Brady child dabbled in naughtiness (Greg smoked! Cindy’s a tattletale!), but they always saw the error of their ways by episode’s end. It was an endearingly naïve world, and we gobbled it up. The Brady Bunch was one of the first series I watched in syndication, years before cable networks like Nickelodeon and Ion Television existed. By the time I was in college, TBS was airing the show each weekday at 4:05 and 4:35, and my roommate and I would make a game out of who could guess which episode it was faster.
Yacht rock
It wasn’t called yacht rock at the time; it was Adult-Oriented Rock (AOR). This style of soft rock music was absolutely inescapable from the mid-’70s to the early ’80s, and why would you want to escape it? The term “yacht rock”, intended pejoratively, was coined in 2005 for an online video series of the same name; the term is derived from the idea of the stereotypical yuppie yacht owner listening to smooth rock while sailing. Typified by artists like Loggins &Messina (and later solo Loggins), Seals & Crofts, and Christopher Cross, yacht rock is as easy as listening gets, and I adore it.
By the way, Spotify seems a little confused about what constitutes “yacht rock”; no, Rockwell is not yacht rock, nor are Tears for Fears, Joe Walsh, or The Police. This playlist I created with my bestie gets a lot closer to the essence of the genre: breezy, cheesy, easy listening.
Flashdance, Footloose, Girls Just Want to Have Fun
The 1980s certainly didn’t have a monopoly on cheesy romantic-musicals, but it sure was a fun time for them (see also: the first entry on this list), and Flashdance, Footloose, and Girls Just Want to Have Fun are three of my favorites. Released in three consecutive years (1983 to 1985), these films have one primary thing in common – all three have main characters who just want to dance! Flashdance’s Alex Owens (Jennifer Beals) is a welder by day and an exotic dancer by night, but what she really wants to be is a ballerina; she’s just too scared to audition. In Footloose, Kevin Bacon plays Ren McCormack, who has just moved to the small town of Bomont, Utah, with his newly single mom, and is appalled to find out that dancing is outlawed in the town. And in Girls Just Want to Have Fun, Bacon’s Footloose co-star Sarah Jessica Parker plays Janey, who wants to be a regular on Dance TV (for those of you who were around in the 1980s, think the Solid Gold dancers), but must defy her retired Army dad to get to the competition (with a little help from her friend Lynne, played by a preposterously young Helen Hunt).
One of the ways MTV impacted the larger culture was in how movies were made; musical montages, where wordless sequences were set to pop music, became de rigueur, and these three films helped popularize that trend. None of them is what you would call a great film (though Footloose comes closest, in part due to the presence of the sublime Dianne Wiest and John Lithgow), but they all bring me joy.
This sequence was added to the film because the late, great Chris Penn legitimately didn’t know how to dance
I will never apologize for my love of disco music, and if you think I should, you’re on the wrong blog. I grew up going to roller skating rinks, and disco was a ’70s roller-rink staple. Disco was one of the rare genres not ruled by straight white men, and that diversity meant music fans could love anyone from ABBA to S.O.S. Band, from Brothers Johnson to Sister Sledge.
Even The Rolling Stones got in on the disco act in the late 70s. Listen to this and tell me it isn’t 100% a disco song:
“Miss You” aside, one of the beautiful things about disco was its inclusivity: it was a place where LGBTQ+ folks and black women were welcomed, and the popular songs tended to be anthemic, songs of empowerment. Of course, a lot of disco songs were just about getting down, and that’s okay, too. There’s a place in this world for both types of music. So whether you want to say “fuck you” to the establishment or shake your booty all night long (or, ideally, both), disco has the perfect song for you.
The chorus of “Le Freak” was originally “fuck off”, not “freak out”. CHIC wrote the song after they were denied entry to Studio 54 on New Year’s Eve 1977 (apparently, Grace Jones forgot to have them added to the guest list). Knowing they could never say “Fuck off” on the radio, Nile Rodgers changed the lyric to “freak off” before finally settling on “freak out”.
Stay tuned for volume 2 of this post in the coming weeks.
PB & Julie + Julie C. Trivia 