I think you have to be an old timer in the Oscar race to really get certain things about it. One of those things is the so-called “Norbit” myth that has its roots in Jeff Wells of Hollywood-Elsewhere’s imagined “take down” campaign of Eddie Murphy during the Dreamgirls. Wells was in the tank for –wait for it — Little Miss Sunshine that year thus, he wanted to do what he could to knock out the competition. At least I think that’s what it was about. I’ll never really know why he went after Murphy or why he went after Mo’Nique (who won anyway). These things remain a mystery. But what I do know? There is no Norbit myth. Eddie Murphy didn’t win because Alan Arkin did. Alan Arkin, you know, Mr. Academy?
You might believe Eddie Murphy’s win was derailed by Norbit opening at the same time and supposedly embarrassing Murphy and more importantly, embarrassing Academy voters. But then you’d be in the awkward position of having to explain why Lauren Bacall lost, or Virginia Madsen, or Kate Hudson, or Bill Murray. You’d have to figure out why voters went the way they did when it was already decided for them. Because that’s what they do. They pick what they want to pick, no matter what. For better or worse.
There is no one with a real thinking brain who is going to look at what Eddie Redmayne did in Jupiter Ascending and think they’d rather give the Oscar to someone else. If anything, Murphy, like Madsen, Bacall, etc. didn’t have a weighty enough performance and they decided to go for the more “serious” performance. Sure, that isn’t the case, necessarily, with Alan Arkin, but in that case you had a Best Picture contender up against a non-Best Picture contender. Almost always the acting wins go to a nominated Best Picture.
Nine times since 2000 Supporting Actor went to a Best Picture contender and only five times did it go a win that wasn’t a Best Picture contender.
Redmayne is up against Michael Keaton, primarily, which explains Wells’ fixation, and both are in Best Picture contending films. The problem with Keaton’s is that he’s up against Redmayne. Redmayne’s only problem is that he’s young. This might be Keaton’s only shot. Voters won’t think that way – they will likely go with their heart. And trust me, they have no clue about Redmayne’s work in Jupiter Ascending. I’m sure the journalists chasing after this story are going for maximum humiliation for all involved but the Oscars don’t really work that way.
Of course if Redmayne loses, Wells will believe it was due to the Norbit factor, but no such factor exists, not in my 16 years of watching this race. Shitty campaign smears? Sure, those work. But this? Nah. By the time they get their ballots voters won’t have even heard of Jupiter Ascending. They won’t hear of it until it trickles down to VOD and then they’ll wonder why they never heard of it. So if Redmayne is to lose, it will have to be for a different reason, like they liked Birdman more.
Kris Tapley’s piece kind of says it all.
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“Eddie Murphy lost because of being everybody’s least favorite person and the Academy didn’t really like the film while they obviously loved Little Miss Sunshine.”
Zooey, I can’t attest to what level of likeability the Academy had for Murphy, but Little Miss Sunshine won 2 Oscars (acting and writing) out of 4 nominations. Dreamgirls won 2 Oscars (acting and sound) out of 8 nominations. Yes Little Miss Sunshine had a best picture nomination but Dreamgirls had twice as many nominations. So to say the Academy didn’t really like the film is to discredit the nominations and wins it received.
Just proves folks will create their own realities about Oscar stuff. I remember one guy doing a list of “biggest Oscar upsets” actually putting “Sandra Bullock over Meryl Streep, 2010,” talking about how Streep was so much the favorite. Really? Because Bullock had the Globe, Critic’s Choice and SAG. Regardless of deserving, she was clearly the front-runner so you’d have be oblivious to count her win as an “upset.” But folks keep to that, annoying but out there.
I’m glad someone mentioned this before we start seeing comments on it around (especially with BAFTAs). The movie was a wild mess but the kind you have to like and I didn’t think Redmayne was even the worst thing about it (at least he acted unlike, say, the TWO LEADS). And I also agree, Moore is even more ridiculous in an even more ridiculous movie but she’s not getting the same hate.
I think it may be because Best Actor is still a hotter race than some assume as Keaton does have support, was considered the real front-runner before the SAGs and might still get some push so folks inventing drama with the idea of “they hate the movie, they won’t give it to a newbie like this” thing. Personally, still lean toward Keaton having more of a lead with Hollywood folks than Redmayne but both quite deserving while I have to wonder if “Sniper’s” box office success might gain Cooper votes to benefit from a split of those two.
Also, I have never bought the “Norbit cost Murphy the Oscar’ thing at all. Arkin had sentiment on his side and clear the Academy wanted to give “Sunshine” some major award and he was the most likely. Of course, for those going “Redmayne won the SAG, means he’ll win the Oscar,” Murphy proved that wrong. But yeah, just never got that excuse and a bit tired of it being used so many times, especially when it’s not even true.
To use a recent example, heard it said “Anne Hathaway would have won in 2009 but Bride Wars came out” when it’s obvious they were going to give it to Winslet when they shifted her “Reader” performance from Supporting to Lead. And “Monuments Men” didn’t hurt Blanchett last year. Just tired of it but folks always love using Oscar season to spice up such things as “huge factors.”
I too actually LIKED “Jupiter Ascending”. And wrote about it at length on my blog. Click on my name above^ and you’ll get there. I was F.U.N. And Eddie R. brilliant actor that he is, was really quite scarily terrific as the evil queen of the universe. And yes, he was playing camp to the max, but he did it SO WELL. I mean at one moemtn with the REAL queen(in this movie) of the universe, Mila Kunis, he got actually, totally demonic. And yes, the script required that he scream at the top of his lungs, and vocal range, so he did.
There’s good camp and there’s bad camp. I admittedly decided to check my brain at the door, as I say, on my blog. And I did. And I enjoyed it for its’-so-bad-it-good unbelievable factor, and the visuals are stunning. And Channing Tatum? In Imax and 3D? What’s not to like?
All this Eddie R smear stuff, by J. Wells, particularly, is people just grabbing as they say a meme and riding it for all the hits they can get. JW in particular this season has been complaining how boring it us, because Julianne Moore, J.K. Simmons and Patricia Arquette are soooo locked. And the only movement at all is in the Best Actor race, and JW is VERY afraid that “Birdman” is going to lose everything. Like “American Hustle” did last year. And I think that may be what’s happening.
As exalted a source as Harvey Weinstein himself said that Richard Linklater is going to win the DGA tonight. And JW will have a very entertaining meltdown-to-end-all-meltdowns. And his hits will stay high, which is really all he cares about anyway. In case there was some doubt.
There’s just been nothing else to write about this week, so he and those like him have to come up with SOMEthing. Bravo, to Kris Tapley by the way.
Glad you enjoyed it Antoinette, I think the movie is getting a raw deal. Then again, I’m biased, I love the Wachowski siblings.
Guess who loved JUPITER ASCENDING? This guy! *points thumbs inward*
Seriously, I want to marry it. I already like it better than all of 2014’s movies combined. I give 0 f*cks what anyone else thinks of it. It’s like DUNE+FLASH GORDON+THE DARK CRYSTAL=one superhappy me. 😀 😀 😀 And if no one else wants it, good. It’ll be all mine.
I do think Eddie will win, deserves to win, and will not be Norbited by this film. And I agree there were other more important factors in Eddie Murphy’s race. However, I take umbrage at the argument that no one could watch Theory and Birdman and simply prefer Keaton’s performance. Obviously that’s not the case, and it’s not simply out of spite for Redmayne or Oscar bait or out of a passion for Birdman or Keaton’s comeback. The two performances are equally worthy and very difficult to compare. It’s possible to think that Keaton’s work is richer, while the Theory script holds Redmayne back despite a compelling and wholly credible physical transformation.
The huge difference here is that Eddie R is considered an actual serious actor. Eddie M. was not (albeit extremely talented). Eddie R and Julianne Moore are being touted as doing fine jobs trapped in bad films. Eddie M was a co-writer, co-producer and above title star of Norbit. The comparisons are ridiculous. Eddie Is Not The New Eddie.
There is no Norbit effect.
Eddie Murphy lost because of being everybody’s least favorite person and the Academy didn’t really like the film while they obviously loved Little Miss Sunshine. Redmayne has so much momentum right now and it’s a good thing that he wasn’t the favorite until two weeks ago, so he doesn’t feel old news.
Of course, even Jeff keeps going back and forth on whether Eddie Murphy was NORBIT-ed. Sometimes insisting he BELIEVES in the theory (and, even helping it along), other times calling it B.S..
Depends on the weather, I guess.
Redmayne wasn’t prominently featured in either the film or its marketing, the flop status of it therefore won’t be considered ‘his fault’ then again I’m sure that as Sasha said, most Academy members don’t even know about this film let alone who has a supporting role in it. What is weird that they went after Redmayne and not Julianne Moore who stars in a bigger flop with even worse reviews and was prominently featured in the marketing as ‘the name actor’ along with Jeff Bridges. Having said that, all this won’t have the smallest effect on the Oscars, anyone who says otherwise simply gives voters more credit than they deserve : a lot of them are famous for voting without even seeing the films so I doubt they will seek out OTHER films of the contenders. I mean if they don’t care about the films they should care about, why would they give a flying fuck about the ones they should not ?
“There is no one with a real thinking brain who is going to look at what Eddie Redmayne did in The Theory of Everything and think they’d rather give the Oscar to someone else.”
Am I reading this sentence incorrectly? Did Sasha really say that Eddie Redmayne is the only true choice for best actor and anyone who disagrees has a mental dysfunction?
You might as well be saying the same thing about Julianne Moore’s destined to flop Seventh Son while you’re at it.
Madsen is a not a particularly interesting race. She was terrific, true. I’d watch her any day over Blanchett but the thing is that she never had a chance. And if you include Madsen here, you should include Amy Ryan as well. Madsen was in a best picture nominee, Ryan wasn’t but both had the disadvantage of being considered favorites when they weren’t. Both Madsen and Ryan swept the critics, but unless you move on to Globe, SAG, BAFTA, critics’ awards don’t matter. And many people refused to give up on Madsen and Ryan when it was clear they had no shot at the Oscar. Madsen and Ryan reigned until the Golden Globes snubbed them and from then on they lost each one of the big awards. Madsen was never a favorite against Cate Blanchett who had the advantage of being the talk of bloggers as the actress victim of one of the worst Oscar robberies and a serious, hard-working actress portraying Katharine Hepburn. Blanchett won the BAFTA and SAG – two awards voted by actual INDUSTRY MEMBERS. Madsen won critics only. This is the big difference and we all knew it. I doubt that Sasha predicted Madsen in 2005. Ryan was the same case. I remember being torn between Dee and Swinton because I knew Dee would have some sentiment and she had SAG but then I thought that we live in an Oscar are where voters fall in love with a film and want to give it an award and sentiment is second to that, so I believe that the thing in the category was: We have to give something to Michael Clayton (a film that was really quite hot in the weeks after the nominations were announced) and supporting actress is our only option. And Swinton had BAFTA, voted by the industry.
And I still don’t get why Hudson was such a huge favorite. Precursor-wise she had the Globe and that’s it. Dench had SAG, McDormand – LA, Critics’ Choice. Harden – NYFCC. Walters – BAFTA.
@akumax, I personally would love it if Bradley Cooper won for American Sniper, I wouldn’t mind it at all. But, Eddie has steamrolled this entire season with his performance in Theory of Everything. It would almost be cruel if he didn’t win, as expected, on Oscar night.
@Paddy, Eddie was so entertaining as Balem that I regret that his role wasn’t larger. He was a trip.
Simone’s right. Eddie Redmayne’s kind of fantastic in Jupiter Ascending. A perfectly campy characterisation, in the tone of both the role and the film in which it’s situated. I wouldn’t trust Eddie to turn in a misjudged performance, he’s too good an actor for that. It was hammy and that was exactly what it should have been. Just an easy type of perf to take down.
I literally didn’t know Redmayne was even in ‘Jupiter Ascending’ until right now, so I doubt Academy voters are tsk-tsking while marking their ballots. There probably is something to the so-called Norbit Effect, however — Murphy’s face was all over the marketing for that terrible movie, and it was a bad look for Murphy to tie himself to another stupid broad comedy when his entire Oscar campaign “storyline” for Dreamgirls was that here was this supreme talent finally getting a chance to shine in a real role.
Academy voters love a comeback story, but not when the comeback is short-circuited by a nominee “relapsing” for lack of a better term into bad habits, such as Murphy in Norbit, Mickey Rourke getting involved with trashy WWE while campaigning for The Wrestler, etc.
That Birdman stan Wells is so transparent. Pathetic really.
Bradley Cooper is winning Best Actor, the only effect preventing Eddie to win is the American Sniper effect. I don’t see a contender who can stop Bradley Cooper from finally winning the third Oscar in a row he deserves.
This Eddie has no problem winning the Oscar this month. He is simply spellbinding.
I just came back from watching Jupiter Ascending and it was a very entertaining, albeit campy sci-fi film. All this silliness about Redmayne is straight up Oscar season attack-hate. The man played a deranged, spoiled and evil planetary royalty brat, he Eddie acted like a deranged, spoiled and evil planetary royalty brat. End of story. Even if this made up ‘Norbit’ Oscar curse crap were for real, Eddie’s part in the film is not as big as people are making it to be. Jupiter reminds me of The Fifth Element, and if you enjoyed that film, then you’ll at the least be able to enjoy Jupiter. All the bad reviews are greatly exaggerated.
There are roles that actors just sink themselves into, allowing their acting brilliance to shine. Then there are roles that those same actors take for $$$. Who really cares? Seriously?