The #8 Oscar Travesty of the Golden Age
Edith Head fails to win the first Best Costume Design award in 1948.
It may not seem such a travesty to you, but it most certainly is. Why? Edith Head was the greatest costume designer in movie history, with 35 nominations and eight victories. In terms of total dominance, only Walt Disney compares to Edith Head--in any category. Head is, ahem, Head and shoulders above the rest. With her stunning loss in 1948, even Edith herself could not conceal her disappointment in losing for her film, The Emperor Waltz:
"There was no doubt in my mind that I would win that Oscar. I deserved it—for longevity if nothing else. I had been doing motion pictures before the Oscar even existed. And besides, my picture had the best costumes of any nominated picture. The serious competition [and the only; just two nominees. ~CKDH] was Joan of Arc, designed by Madame Karinska and Dorothy Kenkins. To my mind, there was no way Ingrid Bergman’s sackcloths and suits of armor could win over my Viennese finery.
Since I am not very emotional, no one knew that I was in shock. My husband squeezed my hand and we watched the remaining presentations, but I do not remember the rest of the evening.”
With the Oscars being the political and business-oriented awards they are, it’s baffling that the Academy did not select Edith Head as its first Best Costume winner. In fact, the result goes against its own unofficial, unspoken policy of rewarding those who’ve “served their time” or “paid their dues.” Head understood this and knew how the Academy and the film industry worked. Yet for some reason, she was not deemed worthy enough to win the category's first award. It’s baffling, especially considering that clunky armor defeated sophisticated material. It’s like Oscar’s politics only work against the people who deserve the award the most.
The #9 Oscar Travesty of the Golden Age
Luise Rainier wins Best Actress Oscars in 1936 and 1937.
Luise Rainier's consecutive Oscar wins were a blight on an otherwise glorious era of cinema. I honestly don't have much ire to vent about her win for The Great Ziegfeld. Yes, it's melodramatic and painful to watch, but the other nominees' performances didn't move me much, either. It didn't make me angry as when Rainier won the next year's award, for The Good Earth. That is when we’ve entered travesty territory! The travesty is that the other nominees she bested all gave career-defining or near-career defining performances. Her winning a second time denied more-deserving actresses two years in a row. It's one thing for an actress to win along with a film's Oscar sweep, but to have it happen two years running is where my incredulity begins. In fact, I'll bet during my more "vulnerable" moments, my eyes will bulge and my face will contort and stretch just like Rainier's did in The Good Earth. It's especially painful when you realize the calibre of performer that she defeated among that year's Best Actress nominees:
Irene Dunne in The Awful Truth
Greta Garbo in Camille
Janet Gaynor in A Star Is Born
Barbara Stanwyck in Stella Dallas
To make matters worse, Rainier split from Hollywood at the peak of her stardom, making an appraisal of what "could have been" impossible. I truly believe that Hollywood wants to forget she ever existed. God bless her for fighting the system, kicking the moguls to the curb before they could do the same to her, and living a long life, but Luise Rainier had no business winning Academy Awards; and certainly not two in a row. Her back-to-back wins exist only as the answer to a trivia question and to serve as a reason to shake one's head in disbelief.
The Golden Age of Hollywood was also the Golden Age of the Academy Awards, right? Ha! The sickening sneer you have on your face is matched by the one I have perpetually smeared on my own grubby mug as I scratch out my own personal Top Ten Oscar Travesties. However, before the series commences, I'd better lay down the ground rules.
Only the Golden Age: For the purposes of this series, let’s just say it’s 1934 to, oh, 1950-something. That way I don’t have to delve into the unpleasantness of Glenda Jackson’s two Oscar wins or the fact that Jerry Goldsmith has only one measly Oscar out of his multitude of nominations.
Snubs: While this qualifies as a travesty in itself, this countdown won’t have me moaning and wailing like an elderly, old-world-widow over Myrna Loy’s zero nominations. More importantly, the list will not discuss “should’ve been nominated” performers, directors, writers, and technical personnel. The travesties will only include the actual nominees of a given year.
Just One Person’s View: Remember, it’s just how I see it. I’m sure everyone out there has their own strongly-held opinions about Oscar’s greatest travesties, and believe me; I can’t wait to read what you consider the best/worst omissions and inclusions.
Now let’s begin the countdown…
The #10 Oscar Travesty of the Golden Age:
Sweet Leilani wins the 1937 Best Song Oscar over They Can't Take That Away From Me.
Apparently, "they" could AND did...take that away from them, that is.
Poor George Gershwin. Not only did the man die at the tragically early age of 38 in July 1937, but to add further insult to this most grievous event, one of his finest compositions, from the Astaire-Rogers musical Shall We Dance, They Can’t Take That Away from Me lost the Best Song Oscar to Harry Owens’ Sweet Leilani. We should all be so lucky as to have a Hawaiian vacation and have a grateful Bing Crosby go to bat for you against a tough Hollywood producer to include your ditty in a most forgettable movie. To be fair, Sweet Leilani must’ve sounded exotic to haole ears in 1937, and Bing Crosby had a huge-selling record with it, so its commercial appeal is also understandable. It still ruffles my feathers, though.
Perhaps Gershwin’s masterwork lost because of his prolonged journey into “highbrow” music. Or maybe it was due to the fact that an Astaire song—The Way You Look Tonight—deservedly won the Best Song Oscar in 1936. Politics always played a part with the Oscars, and this has been proven over the course of many decades. However, to show what a restrained, stand-up blogger I am, this will be the only music-related travesty on the top ten list.
In looking back at just some of Disney’s 1970s live-action cinematic endeavors, this partial list alone reads like a Shakespearean tragedy:
The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes
Bedknobs and Broomsticks
Superdad
The Shaggy D.A.
Freaky Friday
The Apple Dumpling Gang
The Apple Dumpling Gang Rides Again
The Cat from Outer Space (both M*A*S*H commanders are in this: Harry Morgan and McLean Stevenson)
The North Avenue Irregulars (sounds like an ad for adult diapers)
Hot Lead and Cold Feet
Escape from Witch Mountain
Return to Witch Mountain
And of course, The Black Hole (aka “We passed on Star Wars”).
Disney’s animated features have fared a bit better, not that I’ve seen them:
Robin Hood
Pete’s Dragon
The Rescuers
The Fox and the Hound (1981; this one was heavily advertised, so naturally I didn’t go and see it)
Don’t know why Disney eschewed its proud and successful animated tradition for Joe Flynn and Dean Jones, but they did and it’s my first impression of Disney the movie studio. Their less-than-stellar legacy is something I can’t grasp. Why would they make the move to live-action movies when they were the world’s leader in animated feature films dating back to 1937? I honestly want to know. If any Disney aficionados out there are reading this and can answer this question, please comment.
Now, it’s time for some bitter reminiscences...tongue in cheek, of course, but more than a kernel of truth.
I remember my parents always raving about Disney's great animated features, but they were too busy splitting up to take me, I guess. For whatever reasons, I never saw those classic Disney animated films on TV or in any theatrical re-releases there might have been. As a result of my deprived childhood and Disney's ineptitude, I've never seen many of those early Disney classics. Fantasia in particular has eluded me all these years. I haven't even bothered to see them on home video; I'd really prefer seeing them on the big screen, but even that's unlikely as they bastardize their own films with politically correct changes. Jerks. So even the home video aspect of this tragic tale can’t rescue me from my lethargy.
Those of you of the Baby Boomer generation have one more thing to be thankful for, and that’s the superiority of your collective Disney experience over that of the so-called Generation X. You had the novelty of the opening of Disneyland, the weekly Disney show at its 1950s and ‘60s peak and the frequent cinematic re-releases of all those animated Disney classics. Even the Generation Y people have a better Disney nostalgia, with virtually every movie made beginning with The Little Mermaid and on through the ’90s. My generation had the Osmonds singing at Disneyland and Bette Midler and Shelley Long “buddy” movies.
When I was a little kid in the mid-to-late 1970s, Disney wasn't doing much animation. Lots of Ken Berry and Dean Jones live-action crapola which bored me to tears. Plus there was the Herbie the Car series, which I actually didn’t mind, especially Herbie Rides Again. That’s the one with Helen Hayes fighting some monolithic building conglomerate who wants to tear down her humble home in favor of some skyscraper. However, the one movie that stings with remembrance was the 1972 non-opus un-classic, Snowball Express. I had suffered through this wretched movie one day in 1982 and vowed never to put myself through that again. A week or so later, a friend and I were going to a movie house to see a Disney movie with his then-twentysomething brother and his girlfriend. Anyway, the morning we were set to go, my buddy came down with the flu. He got to stay home with the comfort of his fever, chills, and vomiting whereas I had to sit still with “grown ups” (as I classified anyone five years or older than me) who, at least to my mind, were going to talk about “adult” things like college, alcohol, and other non-Star Wars action figure-related topics.
Anyway, guess what “surprise” Disney movie we were set to see? You guessed it: Snowball Express. Seeing that film twice in less than a week almost qualified me to do Charlton Heston’s mouthing the dialogue of the Woodstock documentary in The Omega Man, only without the lost idealism. I did feel like the last person on the planet, though.
I recently watched Snowball Express on TV, not as a way of punishing myself, but rather seeing if my hostility and unpleasant memories still held true. Surprisingly, they did not. I enjoyed it quite a bit. Harry Morgan is fun as always, and there are several TV actors who bring a familiarity and nostalgia to the proceedings: Dick Van Patten (who never seemed to work outside of the 1970s), Johnny Whitaker (Family Affair), George Lindsey (Goober from Andy Griffith), and the great blowhard villain from many a 1970s Disney film, Keenan Wynn. Was it Pinocchio? Did it evoke memories of Fantasia? I wouldn’t know, because I still haven’t seen those films.
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