The Oscars

Hollywood put its annual self-congratulatory show on NBC-TV last week, and for the first time since 1952 the moviemakers picked up their own $850,000 tab. Biggest novelty: no commercials--unless the entire 105 minutes could be classed as one long plug for Hollywood. The show itself was faster paced than usual and was jampacked with world-famed faces, costly dresses, big names and little stretches of boredom. Full of arsenic and old spice on its big night of the year, Hollywood displayed carefree willingness to crack playful jokes about TV.

As things got under way, Jimmy Stewart told the home audience that the uninterrupted program was "being brought to you in living black and white." Bob Hope, back from his Russian junket, noted that there had been TV in all the rooms of his Moscow hotel--"only it watches you"--also called attention to the parades of expensive talent being given away free to television, proving that "the motion-picture industry isn't frightened. It's off its rocker."

Despite its glittering cast and artier-than-thou approach, the show now and again came slowly out of the tube. Not without lively spots (notably a duet of Baby, It's Cold Outside, incongruously teaming Rock Hudson and Mae West, and a song-and-dance routine by Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas), it was better organized than in recent years, but still prone to flat jokes and awkward entrances and exits. All the same, with such old-guard purists as Clark Gable, John Wayne and Gary Grant helping the cause of motion pictures, Producer Jerry Wald figured that the free talent alone would have cost a paying sponsor $2,000,000.

The Oscars, presented with far less fanfare than the celebrities who handed them out, were almost ignored in the razzle-dazzle. With seven Oscars, The Bridge on the River Kwai swept the field for best picture, best director (David Lean) and best actor (Alec Guinness). Relative Newcomer Joanne Woodward (The Three Faces of Eve) was named best actress. Sayonara provided both the best supporting actor (Red Buttons) and supporting actress (Miyoshi Umeki).

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