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TRICKSTERS AND HUCKSTERS: SHOW BIZ ARCHETYPES
by Addison De Witt
“The Envelope Please”
The Academy Awards – watching them, anticipating them, trashing them – have become a unique ritual of our society. But a fairly recent one. The first Oscars were given out in 1928, and they weren’t televised until just 50 years ago. Is there a child alive – or a grown-up, for that matter – who hasn’t stood in the shower with a bar of soap, or in front of the mirror with a hairbrush, and rehearsed his or her acceptance speech? We all share the same fantasy, don’t we?
Whether we become Wal-Mart clerks or movie stars, we all imagine what it’s like to be seated at the Dorothy Chandler Pavillion or the Shrine Auditorium when the nominees in our category are announced, and then suddenly, all time stops, and the world watches as we react with shock, amazement and tears as our name is announced! We kiss our (very attractive) spouse – or brother, as in the case of Angelina Jolie – and then take that famous walk up the steps to the podium while the audience cheers wildly (is a standing ovation in your fantasy, too?). All over the world, people are watching – elementary school teachers, playground bullies, ex-friends and lovers – as we experience the greatest moment of glory imaginable in contemporary culture.
Crossing the finish line first at the Olympics...well, that’s pretty swell. Taking the oath of office in front of the U.S. Capitol (even when you’ve lost the popular vote) has got to be an ego boost, let’s face it. Still, winning the Olympics takes hard work and skill. So does getting elected President of the United States. (George W. got over 40 million votes; you can’t take that away from him.) With just over 5,000 members, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences bestows its Oscars on little more than a whim.
Granted, the nominees in each category are all high-achievers or they wouldn’t be there in the first place. They’re all remarkably talented. But what puts them over the top on Oscar night and into the history books is the capriciousness of a small group of film industry insiders who cast their votes without any specific criteria imposed, without any objective set of guidelines to follow. They just follow their hearts, their guts – even their pocketbooks, in some cases, when an Academy Award for a film can mean millions of dollars in revenue.
We all know this, and still we watch, still we join the office pool, have Oscar night parties, speculate endlessly – even though within a few weeks we’ll have completely forgotten who won. (Quick, what was last year’s Best Picture? The year before?)
Sadly, Dear Reader, I, too, jaded as I am, fall prey to Oscar hysteria, though some years I find myself more engaged than others. As a teenager, it was very close to being my reason for living. (All right, it was my reason for living. But why dwell on my childhood right now? That’s why my Beverly Hills therapist makes the big bucks. Watch for my forthcoming column: “If Neil Simon And I Share The Same Shrink, Will That Make Me A More Succesful Writer?”) While Oscar gold has so far eluded me (to put it mildly), I have had a fleeting moment or two in the Hollywood award season sun.
When I got nominated for a certain prestigious award, I was shocked. I’d done a little cable thing that no one saw; one glance at the competition and I was certain I could not win. Still, I was honored and delighted. Until the day before the ceremony, however, I hadn’t even rented a tuxedo. I had a perfectly good suit to wear. And besides, who was going to notice me sitting in the back, since I knew I wasn’t going to win. Renting a tux would be like saying I thought I had a prayer, and would certainly jinx any thought I had of a surprise upset. But at the last minute, I caved in and rented one – the only thing I hate more than fading into the background is standing out in a crowd, and I didn’t want to be conspicuously under-dressed.
I arrived at the Beverly Hilton amid the flashing cameras of the Hollywood paparazzi and the roped-off fans. There’s nothing more humbling than when a fan or a photographer looks at you, determines you’re not famous, then puts down the camera and waits for someone better to walk by. Trust me, Dear Readers, the red carpet is no fun for “civilians.” I wasn’t surprised to be seated at a table in the back, though two of my dinner companions might have felt dissed: The Olsen Twins were there to be presenters.
Pushing 8 at the time, Mary-Kate and Ashley sat across the table from me all evening, flanked by their two adult handlers, who did everything for them, including cutting their meat. (A pretty good filet mignon, as I recall. Followed by chocolate-dipped strawberries.) I might not have had any contact with the Twins all evening, if they hadn’t ask me how to pronounce my name. As luck would have it, the Olsens were presenting in my category, and were rehearsing the list of nominees to be read. No, no addled Elizabeth Taylor-type presenter for me. No gorgeous starlet, either. Just a pair of curly blonde moppets staying up way past their bedtime.
Finally, after an excrutiatingly long wait, the big moment came and...I won. The photographers had been tipped off, apparently, because they were there flashing their lights in my eyes, catching my look of total shock and paralysis. Even though the event wasn’t televised, my reaction was projected simultaneously on two huge screens on either side of the stage. It took so long for me to negotiate my way to the podium from my table in Siberia, that I can only imagine the polite applause must have died down well before my arrival. My head was somewhere in outer space and I wouldn’t have noticed a 6.9 earthquake at that moment.
I got up to the podium and found a large black box in front of it, which the Olsen Twins had stood upon to enable them to reach the microphone. I took the award from these two completely expressionless children, but had to confront that box, which was in the way of my reaching the microphone. At first I started to stand on it, which elicited a wave of laughter from “my peers” in the audience. Remembering my vaudeville roots (all right, so I don’t have vaudeville roots, but I can dream, can’t I?), I did a little physical shtick with the box and got a few more laughs. At the microphone at last, I said, “The Olsen Twins were at my table during dinner...” Then, turning to my new best friends, Mary-Kate and Ashley, I said, “Girls, I told you to announce my name no matter what the envelope said, but I didn’t think you’d really do it.” This got even more laughter. I wish I could say I looked out to a smiling crowd, but with the bright lights in my eyes, I could see no one, just a black void. I had no speech prepared – except for the one I’d been saying in the bathroom since I was younger than the Olsens. Since that speech involved thanking movie stars who were no longer living, I quickly, off the top of my head, thanked a few people who worked on the film, said I was honored, and got off.
Clutching my Award, I was directed into the wings, where the Twins and I were ushered to a photographer who took our picture against an Award logo background. We were then ushered to the Press Room, where a large phalanx of photographers instantly went ga-ga for the Olsens: “Ashley!” “Mary-Kate!” “Ashley, over here!” “Mary-Kate, look over here!” Not since the glory days of Lief Garrett had so much fuss been made over so...little. The girls smiled on cue, while I stood off to the side, holding my Award, completely ignored. It remains one of the funniest, most surreal moments of my life.
I was then unceremoniously released to return to my table and remembered to breathe again. (I never saw the Olsen Twins again, until last week I happened upon them at Barnes and Noble. Teenagers now, they were looking at CD’s in the music section. If they remembered me, they didn’t say. I chose not to violate their relative anonymity by approaching them to talk over old times.) The next morning, the producer of a Top 10 television sitcom called my agent to ask me to write an episode for his show. He’d been at the Awards the night before, and thought my speech was hysterical. (The Award had been for a film about suicide.) That’s Hollywood.
Postscript: Six years later, Dear Reader, I was nominated again. This time, I was a shoo-in. The movie was well-publicized, huge ratings, the competition was negligible. The first time I was nominated, I thought it was a fluke. Such a prestigious award! When I won, I was convinced that any shmo could win, if I could. As Groucho Marx famously said: “I wouldn’t want to belong to any club that would have me for a member.” But this time, I was ready for it. I didn’t think about renting a tux: I bought one. I had an entire table full of family and friends with me to cheer me on. I even composed a speech (in my head). There was a grown-up presenter this time, and when the big moment came – you guessed it, I lost. Ah, DeWitt, hubris is thy name!
The shortest speech in Oscar history was a simple “Thank you.” The longest was purportedly delivered by Greer Garson, accepting her Best Actress Oscar in 1942 for “Mrs. Miniver”. Some sources say her speech went on for 45 minutes, others say twice that long. I still have the Oscar speech I composed when I was 12 in the back of my mind somewhere. It begins with thanking the Academy, of course. I thank my co-workers and friends. And my family, most of all. But after (ahem) two decades in the Show Business trenches, I have a new fantasy speech. It’s the one in which I thumb my nose at everyone who ever did me wrong, stabbed me in the back, broke my (professional) heart. It’s not the innocent fantasy of a child, but it’s a lot more fun!
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