The Big Show, 1974
By RICHARD SCHICKEL
It was a cautiously balanced set of Oscars that were handed out last week. The Sting sweep (best picture, best director, best original screenplay, four minor prizes) could have surprised only those who cling to the fantasy that Hollywood's Academicians enjoy rewarding controversy (The Exorcist), truth telling (Cries and Whispers, American Graffiti) or success that is merely modest (A Touch of Class). The best-actor and best-actress choices--Jack Lemmon and Glenda Jackson--were also safe and sane. He is a popular local boy; she is a remote great lady winning her second Oscar in three years. Youth and age were equally served by the selections of ten-year-old Tatum O'Neal and 71-year-old John Houseman, sometime producer, as supporting actress and actor of the year.
By this time, however, the Oscar ceremonies have established a life of their own, and the question of whether they serve truth and justice is less important to television viewers than whether the big broadcast fulfills its implicit annual promise to turn into a psychological Le Mans with a few expensive, finely tuned egos successfully negotiating the twists and turns of the three-hour course while a satisfying number of the other entrants crash. There was nothing this year to equal the spectacular flame-out that Marlon Brando arranged in 1973, but a dedicated Oscar addict could pass out a few prizes of his own:
BEST SUPPORTING PERFORMANCE BY A
GREAT AND GOOD FRIEND: Cybill Shepherd Freudian-slipping in plugs for Director Roommate Peter Bogdanovich's films as she coyly read "Paper Moon" for The Paper Chase, "The Last Picture Show" for The Last Detail, while reciting the nominees for the best supporting actor.
LONGEST EGO STREAK: John Huston playing his self-beloved role of rebel boy while delivering the Establishment message that we all ought to take the awards more seriously.
NOSE JOB OF THE YEAR: Sting Screenwriter David Ward thumbing his in the con man's recognition signal featured in his script. Obviously he understood the true worth of his work better than the majority of the voters.
WRETCHED EXCESS (1): Costumer Edith Head's eighth Oscar for The Sting, for remembering how people dressed back when she began her career in 1923.
WRETCHED EXCESS (2): Katharine Hepburn's love of herself for finally attending the party after regretting 41 previous annual invitations. Everyone's pleasure in her modest triumph over justifiable nausea quite overwhelmed her reason for being there: to present the Irving Thalberg Award to Producer Lawrence Weingarten.
MOTHER OF THE YEAR: William Peter Blatty's. The Exorcist writer's tribute to her topped all the other expressions of genetic gratitude because she had the good sense to immigrate to the U.S. on a suitably humble cattle boat.
MOST PROMISING NEWCOMER TO THE REVELS: Composer Marvin Hamlisch. whose three prizes* set a house record, and whose gratitude to Maalox for getting him there seemed more heartfelt than everyone else's de rigueur tributes to directors and crews.
SOREST LOSERS: The Exorcist bunch, miming superiority to the whole business as crass commercial competitors kept walking off with the prizes that they felt their delicate little art film should have won.
SWEETEST CHARITY: Groucho Marx's honorary Oscar. To see film's great anarchist spirit dimmed by age occasioned the night's only long, sad thoughts.
MOST HOPEFUL SIGN: The cinematography prize for Sven Nykvist, Ingmar Bergman's great cameraman. Hollywood can occasionally recognize production merit that is not ingrown.
MOST UNWORTHY SUSPICION: That with all this going on, the producers would go out and hire a streaker to hype the proceedings. Why should such doubts, even if well founded, detract from the evening's liveliest and most deeply felt appearance?
Richard Schickel
* For his adaptive scoring of The Sting; the best song from, and the original dramatic scoring of The Way We Were.
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