“I wrote 63 songs this year. They’re all about Jeter.” Just kidding. The game we love, the players we hate, and more.
From Norman Mailer to Wendy Pepper — everything on film, TV, books, music, and snacks (shut up, raisins), plus the Girls’ Bike Club.
Helping public schools, winning prizes, sending a crazy lady in a tomato costume out in public.
Monologues, travelogues, fiction, and fart humor. And hens. Don’t forget the hens.
The Tomato Nation advice column addresses your questions on etiquette, grammar, romance, and pet misbehavior. Ask The Readers about books or fashion today!
TWoP’s Oscars coverage is up, including the real-time blog, featuring Matt Zoller Seitz, Odienator, Joe R, and myself; and the post-telecast Galaxy Of Fame, written by me with assists from Wing and Joe.
I’ve (re-)discovered a few things over the course of the recent Days Of Rage. Some of them are great!
I found it while researching a murder (…this is a sentence I have more frequent use for than most), the true story of a neighborhood legend from my childhood. I grew up in a leafy, …
I was so horrified when I saw DDL chawing away! Almost as horrified as when I saw his hair…and his wife’s dress…
I didn’t notice the gum. I was still blinded by the schmatte his wife was wearing.
Am I the only one who is kinda peeved that Brad Renfro didn’t get a nod in the “dead people” montage? He died like a week before Ledger did.
And, like, I know he hasn’t been a somebody in like 15 years, but he was a PRETTY BIG DEAL when he was in that movie with Susan Sarandon when he was like 12.
I didn’t even watch, so I had to Google that dress.
Oh, why’d I DO that???
If you took off the bows in front & use black ribbon on the shoulders, or none, or…
Should I stop trying to “fix” that dress in my imagination? Good! Now, let’s talk SHOES…wth is with his brown shoes??? And hers – are those zebra? WTH?
And gum too? These folks need to get out more, maybe. Wow.
Tisha_, I was mad about that, too. He was also in “Ghost World,” which was out not that long ago, so he’d been working more recently.
I noticed the gum but it didn’t bug me that much. Maybe he was just worried about having bad breath?
OMFG, what was with that hideous blue thing? Did she, like, make a deal with the devil years ago–“let me marry Daniel and I will do anything for you!” and the devil says, “Hmmm, okay, you can marry him and I’ll get back to you about what you have to do” and than he shows up with that thing and says “I took fifteen generations of your great grandmamas’ costume jewelry and used hellfire to forge THIS AND YOU HAVE TO WEAR IT TO THE OSCARS BWAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!”
Seriously, that’s the only thing I can think of.
I was pissed about Brad Renfro too. He may not have made as many movies as Heath, but the ones he did make, like Ghost World, tended to be really good, and he was great in them. He certainly never made anything like Casanova or 10 Things I Hate About You.
I did like that Once won best song, and John Stewart brought Marina (?) out so she could make her speech. That was classy.
Something about the movement of his jaws said ‘Chaw’ rather than ‘Gum’. . .
Tisha_ and JennB, the consensus on another website I read was that he was maybe not an Academy member, and that the death montage was only of Academy members. Apparently, if you’re nominated, you’re automatically a member, so Heath Ledger was in for sure, but it seemed that Brad Renfro was not.
Could DDL be a raving chain smoker? He was conspicuously absent at one point (as was pointed out by someone collecting an award!), and the gum could have been nicotine gum. It’s a long day for a nervous smoker.
JennB, well, I’m glad I’m not the only one.
He was also in Bully and some other stuff within the last 10 years. I always thought he was a good actor and really COULD HAVE been something if he had made some different choices in life.
Also, do they always do the death dates as “January 1, 2007 – January 31, 2008” or did they extend it this year, so that they could include Heath Ledger? For some reason, it seems like it’s always been “January 1, 2007 – December 31, 2007” in previous broadcasts.
Here’s a link to a little article about the Renfro snub. I call bull. They couldn’t have added five seconds to the montage?
Nitpick time – Whatever you think about Juno, it’s a bit unfair to blame it for Sarah Polley not winning when one was in Adapted Screenplay and the other in Original.
Am I the only person who liked Steve Carell & Anne Hathaway more than Rogan & Hill? I’m OK with that.
The two questions we had last night (aside from “What? No Brad Renfro?”) were “Why is Diablo Cody wearing Barney Rubble’s clothing?” and “Could anyone but Tilda Swinton have gotten away with wearing part of a Hefty bag to the awards?”
Yeah, where was Renfro? Certainly some of those people were more random than he.
Did I seriously glance over and say ‘Johnny Depp is chewing GUM??’ and it was DDL?? If so, what does that say about the look DDL is rocking right now? Was JDepp even there (he must have been, right, for Sweeney)? Were they BOTH chewing gum?
Anyone?
@Devin: Oops, good point. But I’m on four hours’ sleep, so…it can stay the way it is.
DDL’s wife looks like a life-size version of a Fisher Price Cocktail Party set.
I thought your recap/live blogging was hilarious, though re: Tisha_Says’ comment, if they extended the death deadline to include Heath, they could have extended it a another week or so to include Roy Scheider.
In other news, I loved everything having to do with Once, and felt for Amy Adams – she seemed so nervous singing that insane song live with no one prancing around in a roach or pigeon costume to distract the audience from the panicked look on her face.
And Johnny Depp was chomping away at something too. Maybe it was Crazy Gumâ„¢ and DDL had passed it around to all the cool kids before the Oscars began.
[quote] Could DDL be a raving chain smoker? [/quote]
yes he is. I met him after the Irish premier screening of TWBB just off o’connell street and he’d legged it from the Q+A session in the savoy to smoke a rollie. He was awesome and sweet and we chatted and shook hands.
I thought Amy Adams was lipsynching, that’s why she looked so crazed. I couldn’t understand why they bothered giving her the madonna mic.
@Siobhan – I’m pretty sure she wasn’t lip-synching, because she was so clearly running out of air at the end of nearly every phrase in the second half of the song. I’m an opera singer, and I’ve had performances like that — when you’re nervous, you can start rushing and then you miss a breath and then, BAM!, you can’t get your breath back without missing a beat. I felt bad for Amy there, and I was totally cringing behind a pillow muttering, “Take a breath, take a breath, OMFG, TAKE A DAMN BREATH, WOMAN!”
Seriously, I expected her to start hyperventilating.
Heh. I just googled and there’s a 50/50 split on people saying she was or she wasn’t. I thought her mouth wasn’t matching the sound at the beginning of the song, so maybe the broadcast was off.
There was also that cringe-worthy off-key moment near the end there that had me believing that she was definitely singing herself. But hey, mad props to her for doing it in the first place – I don’t think many actresses would have the balls to do a song that hard live.