Who Should Have Been Invited to the Academy's Acting Branch (a Year-by-Year Simulation)

One of the less publicized elements of the Academy Awards is who gets invited to join the Academy every year. Every year, a press release gets sent out and it usually gets pushed down to the proverbial page six of Hollywood trade magazines. It doesn’t really get much more than an obligatory post on corresponding entertainment websites.

From digging up press releases, it appears that about 20-25 are from the actors branch. This often includes people who have just been nominated for the first time (provided they didn’t get an at-large invite).

This is the 2014 list which includes 5 first-time nominees from the year before, a nominee from 2005 (David Straithairn) who’s paperwork must have gotten lost in the shuffle, a variety of people who were hot at the moment (Josh Hutcherson coming off the Hunger Games; Julia Louis-Dreyfuss having the hit movie Enough Said) with people who had been amassing notable roles for a while (Ben Foster, Beth Grant)

Barkhad Abdi – “Captain Phillips”, Clancy Brown – “The Hurricane,” “The Shawshank Redeption”
Paul Dano – “12 Years a Slave,” “Prisoners”, *Michael Fassbender – “12 Years a Slave,” “Shame”,
Ben Foster – “Lone Survivor,” “Ain’t Them Bodies Saints”, Beth Grant – “The Artist,” “No Country for Old Men”, Clark Gregg – “Much Ado about Nothing,” “Marvel’s The Avengers”, *Sally Hawkins – “Blue Jasmine,” “Happy-Go-Lucky”, Josh Hutcherson – “The Hunger Games,” “The Kids Are All Right”. Julia Louis-Dreyfus – “Enough Said,” “Planes”, Kelly Macdonald – “Brave,” “No Country for Old Men”, Mads Mikkelsen – “The Hunt,” “Casino Royale”, Joel McKinnon Miller – “Super 8,” “The Truman Show”, Cillian Murphy – “The Dark Knight Rises,” “Inception”, *Lupita Nyong'o – “Non-Stop,” “12 Years a Slave”, Rob Riggle – “21 Jump Street,” “The Hangover”, Chris Rock – “Grown Ups 2,” “Madagascar” *June Squibb – “Nebraska,” “About Schmidt”, Jason Statham – “Parker,” “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels”. David Strathairn – “Lincoln,” “Good Night, and Good Luck.

But what if we made parlor games out of who would get invited each year to the extent that we obsess around predicting the Oscars? Wouldn’t that be fun for us? Well, I can certainly say it was fun for me when I tried this exercise out for myself for the last 15 years.

I’m going to also operate under a few assumptions:

-An actor has to have at least appeared in a film in the past year before the Oscars.

-To squeeze the pressure on the process, 12 per year

-Breakout performances by people who were unknown before will have a harder time getting in because the Academy would want to award people who’ve been at it at least for a little while. At the same time, people who are hot right now, either commercially, or just earned Oscar buzz but didn’t make the cut, would also get strong consideration so there will be a balance between these forces.

-Comedy doesn’t get rewarded at the Oscars so this will be a way that the Academy would be to even the playing field.

-Actors who are successful in another medium like TV or Broadway will get in a bit more immediately once they make a good film

-As with the Oscar nominations, your chances of getting in will go up if you’re attached to a film that gets a lot of awards

-Child actors Hailie Steinfeld and Quevenzhane Wallis were not invited to join the Academy after being nominated. This is probably because they would need parental approval to even watch the other nominated movies and attend Academy-sanctioned events, so I’m assuming the Academy would have a preference for adults

-The Academy would have a need for international diversity to an extent. It would be hard enough for a critical mass to gather around an obscure film from, say, Bangladesh, but the kinds of international films that make dents at the Oscars would gain advantage. After #oscarssowhite, I’m assuming that there was a shift from international diversity to racial diversity

I’ll show you one example of my picks:

2008:

Aaron Eckhart-Eckhart broke out in the 1997 indie film In the Company of Men and had been more of a B-list leading man (someone who might carry an off-beat film) than someone at the top of the casting charts. This pick would be a response to Dark Knight being the biggest hit of the year and spillover from a number of leading roles in less successful films like Thank You for Smoking and No Reservations.

Ann Savage-An 87-year-old actress who dazzled in the 1945 film Detour before languishing in obscurity and being rediscovered at a screening of her film (literally: People didn’t know she was in attendance). She was cast in the indie My Winnipeg.

Brendan Gleeson-Today, Brendan Gleeson is a lot more visible considering his starring role in Mr. Mercedes, his guest role in his kids’ series Frank of Ireland, his lead in the dark morality tale Calvary, and his Oscar-nominated role in Banshees of Inisherin. He had a string of memorable supporting roles but it’s arguable if Cold Mountain or Gangs of New York would have caught the attention enough to meet the threshold.

Dev Patel and Frida Pinto-I’m assuming that the Academy’s love for Slumdog Millionaire also includes a wake-up call that they have few South Asians among their ranks.  

Hiam Abbass-Abbass got some Oscar buzz for the Oscar underdog  The Visitor which managed to land Richard Jenkins one of the unlikeliest lead actor nominations I’ve ever witnessed. She went on to play the mom in Ramy.

James Franco-It’s highly possible James Franco could have gotten earlier considering Spiderman was such a big sensation when it broke the $100 million mark in 2002 and he had a big presence in all three films. He also did headline his first film Annapolis in 2006, but 2008 is when he starred in Milk (garnering significant  Oscar buzz) which was a BP nominee and showed off his comic (pot-smoking) side in Pineapple Express.

Mathieu Alarmic-Rose to prominence the year before with The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (hello, indie cred) and then was a Bond villain (ironically, in one of the franchise’s more arty attempts with its en media res beginning and brooding pathos) so the commercial box is checked as well.  

Oliver Platt-Frost/Nixon was a BP nominee that featured four character actors who had not been nominated. Michael Sheen, Kevin Bacon, Oliver Platt, and Sam Rockwell. I’m assuming Bacon (who has been acting since the 80s) would have made the cut by now. Although a lot of people like to reverse engineer Sam Rockwell’s career since his Oscar win to suggest he was always hot shit, he was more of a cult figure who was consistently reliable but rarely on the top of the marquee. Sheen’s biggest roles required him to be overshadowed by a bigger personality (Queen, Frost/Nixon). Platt has been one of the Three Musketeers and headlined his own TV show but has he ever had his day in the sun?

Karen Allen-Without checking IMDB, can you name the highlights of Karen Allen’s career outside Indiana Jones? It’s actually not a bad list: Starman, In the Bedroom, Malcolm X, National Lampoon’s Animal House, The Perfect Storm and the Sandlot, although these roles are all pretty small. Still, being a solid working actress for the preceeding 25 years combined with one certifiable pop culture icon as Marion Ravenwood is enough to get her in.

Shia LaBeouf-The only disadvantage would have been youth in 2008. As the heir apparent to Indiana Jones and the leading man of Transformers, LaBeouf was killing it commercially and still made room for a number of smaller films like Eagle Eye, Disturbia, Bobby, and a Guide to Recognizing Your Saints over the past three years.

Thandiwe Newton-Playing Condolezza Rice in W. was a pretty high task even if it didn’t garner Oscar nomination (that director Oliver Stone peaked between 1986 and 1991 all but ensured that none of the actors from W. would never be considered). There wasn’t as much of a push for racial diversity, but there was still some and she was the female lead in Run Fatboy Run the year before and had appeared in the best picture winner Crash. She'd go on to win an Emmy for Westworld.

Runners-Up: Scott Glenn, Emile Hirsch, Christina Ricci, Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Sam Rockwell, Michael Sheen, Omar Benson Miller

 

2009:
Danny McBride, Emily Blunt, James Gandolfini, James McAvoy, Joseph Gordon-Leavitt, Maya Rudolph, Melanie Laurent, Michael Stuhlbarg, Melanie Lynskey, Ryan Reynolds, Sam Rockwell, Zoe Saldana

Runners Up: Paula Patton, Rachel Harris, Daniel Bruehl, Dianne Kruger, Rachel McAdams, Bradley Cooper, Rosamund Pike

2010:

Andrew Garfield, Daniel Radcliffe, Dwayne the Rock Johnson, Emma Watson, Emily Mortimer, Jason Schwartzman, Jon Hamm, Mila Kunis, Paul Rudd, Rachel McAdams, Vincent Cassell, Zach Galifianakis

Runners-Up: Olivia Williams, Michael Cera, Patrick Wilson, Steve Carell

2011

Anthony Mackie, Armie Hammer, Beth Grant, Bradley Cooper, Emma Stone, Jay Zhao, Justin Timberlake, Ian McShane, Kristen Wiig, Michael Fassbender, Steve Carrell, Tom Hardy

Runners-Up: Olivia Wilde, Wendy McLoven-Coverly, Matt Lillard, Judy Greer, Ed Helms, Missi Pyle, Rose Byrne, Chris Dowd

2012:

Anne Dowd, Amanda Seyfreid, Aubrey Plaza, Ben Whishaw, Eddie Redmayne, Jason Schwartzman, John Ortiz, Kerry Washington, Martin Freeman, Matthew McConaughey, Rashida Jones, Suraja Sharma

Runners-Up: Billy Connolly, Andrew Sachs, Kyle Chandler, Carmen Ejogo

2013:

Benedict Cumberbatch, Channing Tatum, Daniel Bruehl, David Oyelowo, David Warhofsky, Dwight Henry, Jennifer Garner, Lake Bell, Margo Martindale, Michael B Jordan, Michael Kelly, Simon Pegg, Steve Coogan

Runners-Up: Idris Elba, Joel Edgerton, Isla Fisher, Sarah Paulson, Charlie Day, Burn Gorman, Jason Sudeikis, Will Forte, Kathryn Hahn, Greta Gerwig, Sharlito Copely

2014:

Chris Rock, Chris Pratt, Gugu Mbuthu-Raw, Kim Dickens, Lindsey Duncan, Neil Patrick Harris, Oscar Isaac, Peter Dinklage, Riz Ahmed, Rene Russo, Scoot McNairy, Timothy Spall

Runners-Up: Kristen Stewart, Charles Dance, Matthew Goode, Paddy Considine, Sienna Miller, Jeremy Strong, Merritt Weaver

2015-2022

I'm going to keep this part of the list under wraps for now because I want to either invite guests or submit this elsewhere

New YouTube Video: An Imperfect Guide to Every Best Supporting Actress Ever

A massive project of mine. I learned to edit on YouTube recently and have now taken my YouTube videos to the next level. Because I didn't initially think I would know how to edit, I just downloaded tons of still pictures from Google's Image Search (around 70 and all) and fed them to a friend who knew how to edit for $70. I recorded all the way to Jo Van Fleet's win for East of Eden in 1955 but I assumed people's viewing appetite was 20 minutes or so, and I was extremely careful about not going over.

If you're interested in classic film you might find it interesting but I hope that it awakens people to the fact that there are interesting films and interesting stuff about the films before they were born.

I could have undertaken a project to watch every film that won an Oscar in this category but I thought it was more entertaining to just go in the other direction and just riff on what I didn't know. After all, there are enough know-it-alls out there about film. My goal was to be educational but also entertaining and find my own sweet spot somewhere in there.

RIP to Mozart in the Jungle's Blair Tindall, an Interview Subject of Mine

In 2016, I was a struggling freelance journalist that wrote an article about the TV show Mozart in the Jungle that got Blair Tindall’s attention. She took the time to message me on Twitter and tell me my piece was great. When I expressed doubt that my editors liked me much and that I was doing ok in journalism, she encouraged me further in private messages to have a “screw the editors, you’re good” mindset,

Tindall lived an adventurous and financially rocky life like mine (the kind worth living) and she really meant a lot to me. Her book is an inspiration to all artists who find a balance between passion and stability. I eventually found her Her show was an exciting entrance into the world of classical music.

She also agreed to do a public interview with me a few years later, and her generosity won’t be forgotten. I’m really glad to have briefly known her, she was a generous and classy person, and I mourn her loss with the rest of the Mozart in the Jungle fan community.

I whole-heartedly recommend Mozart in the Jungle as both a read and as a TV show.

 

 

What I’m Watching March Edition: Not Dead Yet, Night Court, Poker Face, Hello Tomorrow, Animal Control, Night Court

Not Dead Yet (ABC):
Capitalizing on Ghosts, Gina Rodriguez plays obituary writer Nell. During the period of her obituary assignment, she can see dead people.

It’s one of many female-centered shows about a woman who doesn’t have her life together in the vein of Dollface, Maggie, Girls, Single Drunk Female, and can trace its lineage to Mary Tyler Moore.

However, Mary Tyler Moore never looked that far down on its protagonist. One problem of this subgenre is that it casts broad labels over women based on whether they’re in a relationship or have achieved a certain career goal.

There’s also one of the autistic leads from As We See It here as the autistic apartment owner and roommate for Nell, which is an interesting wrench to throw in the works of typical sitcom character conflict.

The show is watchable but hasn’t really hit its stride yet. No relationship is really the stuff that would make lists of TV’s “Most ruthless boss” or “Most heart-warming besties” and I get the feeling the show is going for those kinds of archetypes.

It is getting closest in building a must-see relationship in the friendship-triangle between the protagonist and her frenemy boss (Lauren Ash) and the coworker (Hannah Simone) who’s allegiances are caught in the middle.

Watching the Not Dead Yet half-handle its world-building is just a reminder of how remarkable Ghosts has been at ironing the concepts of how the interaction between dead and living works.

Still watchable.

Animal Control (Fox)- McHale’s roguish devil-may-care charm that carried Community for umpteenth seasons is ready made for single camera comedy. He borrows many of the same features as Jeff Winger: In particular, he’s a slacker with a capital S. It does help to differentiate tham a little that this guy doesn’t get laid as often as Winger does.

The problem is it’s hard not to simply see this as a Joel McHale vehicle. The cast isn’t completely flat but there are no stand outs. Gerry Dee comes closest as Templeton Scruggs who appears on the right side of a couple of the best plots. He’s a Michael-Scott-type blow hard but he’s a little more substantial.

There’s also a guy with an Andy Samberg haircut who won a snowboarding bronze medal which I personally love as a character trait because I’m a connoisseur of winter sports; still, this is pretty much an informed ability. What I’m saying is I want to see discount Andy Samberg hang a flying squirrel before I invest in this guy.

There’s also a woman who looks exactly like Chelsea Peretti but has an Australian accent which is kind of jarring.

But, I’m just riffing here. It’s not the most original set of comic characters, but the chemistry between the characters and the quality of the over-arching plots makes this a far better attempt at all-out silliness than, say, Brooklyn Nine-Nine. I dig it.

Mayfair Witches (AMC)-This witch drama really aims for sex appeal. If you want to see Alexandra Daddario (the otherworldly-looking brunette with smoldering good looks from The White Lotus) get involuntarily aroused on an airplane or see an early 20th century tryst between a white-eyed woman and a ghost, this show’s got it all.

Daddario’s character, Rowan Fielding, is the typical no-nonsense heroine that populates many a procedural: She’s got brains (she’s a neurosurgeon); her vulnerability on her sleeve is visible from miles away; she’s unapolagetically sex positive (hence, more sex scenes, yay!), she’s independent, and she’s properly defiant against any and all mansplainers. What’s more, Daddario elevates the material so that the character works even better in practice.

The series takes place in New Orleans and plays well off the city’s lore surrounding the occult. That it’s based on an Anne Rice novel also adds pedigree. The show isn’t a slow burn as Rowan and a couple of the side characters (the uber-prolific character actor Beth Grant plays Rowan’s great-aunt) are interesting enough to watch.

As for the larger mythology, it’s solid but how much that hooks you will likely depend on how into witches and warlocks you are.

Night Court (NBC)-This one is reviewed over at TV Fanatic. Basically, the dialogue and the jokes are often very lazy but, hey, I’m still watching it 11 episodes in, so something about it is working.

https://www.tvfanatic.com/2023/03/night-court-flawed-as-great-tv-effective-as-comfort-food/

Poker Face (Peacock)-The short review here is that the show has serial elements which don’t work and procedural elements which are generally a delight. Riann Johnson has proven himself one of his generation’s top film makers, and especially a master of mystery in the Knives Out series, so he adds a lot of pedigree here. Natasha Lyonne’s character is 95% Colunbo impression and 5% her own thing. This slightly disappointing, but hey who doesn’t like modern-day reimaginings of Columbo in the body of a fiery redhead. The guest star roster (especially Judith Light and S. Epatha Merkerson) is epic. Some of the episodes are unbelievably cinematic. A couple are duds but that’s part for the course. The overarching serialization (she’s on the run from a Vegas mobster) is thin

Hello Tomorrow! (Apple)-Mad Men meets 50s era sci-fi. I’m unclear exactly what year the show takes place, but it hardly matters as the show is decidedly ahistoric. This is a parallel version of the 50s where we didn’t just land on the moon but were able to quickly subdue it for human colonization to the point that we were selling real estate on it.

This show reflects a 1950s era sensibility in which men are bread winners, and there’s no better way to win that bread than don a suit and sell something.

But wait! Were real estate prices as suffocating in big cities in that era as they are today? Didn’t we not go to the moon until 1970 when society was more populated with hippies with long-hair? Again, best not to think too much about historic details.

The series anachronisms’ are tied together quite well anyway under the umbrella of 50s-era sci-fi where writers were coming from uncertainty about what the space age would bring.

It’s not until the show’s 5th episode that anything crucial really happens to the plot but what drives the series is that it has a strong sense of place and time and the heavy hitters — Billy Crudup, Alison Pill, Hank Azaria, and Susan Heyward (not the Oscar-winning actress from the 40s and 50s) — infuse the drama so well.

Poker Face (Peacock)-The short review here is that the show has serial elements which don’t work and procedural elements which are generally a delight. Riann Johnson has proven himself one of his generation’s top film makers, and especially a master of mystery in the Knives Out series, so he adds a lot of pedigree here. Natasha Lyonne’s character is 95% Colunbo impression and 5% her own thing. This slightly disappointing, but hey who doesn’t like modern-day reimaginings of Columbo in the body of a fiery redhead. The guest star roster (especially Judith Light and S. Epatha Merkerson) is epic. Some of the episodes are unbelievably cinematic. A couple are duds but that’s part for the course. The overarching serialization (she’s on the run from a Vegas mobster) is thin