Thoughts while watching the Oscars:

I'm not actually counting, but I think that they just showed a tiny piece of each of the previous 74 Best Pictures. This being the 75th Academy Awards, you see. If this is how they are starting, they are almost certain to break the 5 hour mark this year. Here's hopin'!

Thank Christ they brought Steve Martin back, I couldn't have stood another year of Whoopi.

(gesturing towards the glamourous stage behind him) "Well, I'm glad they cut back on all the glitz. You probably noticed there was no fancy red carpet tonight. That'll send 'em a message!"

Man, Calista Flockhart never would have in a million years have gotten such good seats at the Oscars if she wasn't dating Harrison Ford. A lesson for us all, I think.

I don't think that many Mickey Rooney jokes have been told all in a row since about 1942. They certainly were fresh, though one can only imagine the younger and stupider actors in the crowd thinking, "Who is Steve talking about? Who's that old midget in the back waving his arms? When are they going to start talking about me? Ooh, shiny!"

I can only imagine that Nicole Kidman does not expect to win, or else she would not look so appalling. With her hair all scraped back into that severe bun and that thick cat-woman eyeliner, she looks as though she is this week's guest villain on Batman.

Nicholson's glasses are getting darker and darker. Has he gone completely blind and just hasn't mentioned it? And he is sitting next to Nic Cage. Apparently, they are bringing their relationship out into the light at last. Wait, on his other side is Halle Berry. Which one is the beard?

Gosh, Queen Latifah looks lovely. Like she could breast-feed the Eastern seaboard, but lovely.

That was a reasonably good opening monologue. Not great, and that whole "What is a Movie Star" thing could have been sped up a trifle, but it was okay. And how big a crush does he have on Halle Berry, he made three separate jokes about how much he wants to fuck her!

Cameron Diaz is giving out the first award? It can't be Best Supporting Actor or Actress, then, as it usually is. Ah, it's Animated Feature. Wow, if you are going to spackle that much make-up on your face, Cameron, why don't you brush your hair out of said face so that we can get the full effect? She looks like Cousin Itt's slutty sister.

Wow, Spirited Away won! I am quite startled, though I understand that it is the best in the category. That's no reason for it to actually win, though.

Keanu Reeves is presenting. Enjoy the view, Keanu, you'll never be on that stage for any other reason! He's presenting Visual Effects. They are trying to throw us off centre by not having any actors up front. I can handle it, Oscars, you won't send me into a spiral of insanity with your re-arranging of categories all willy and nilly!

Poor Lord of the Rings people, four of them win and only the one who can elbow his way to the mic first gets to speak, the others get played off as soon as they attempt to open their mouths. Of course, anyone who has ever watched an awards show knows that this will happen, but it's still so touching to see their little lips flapping as the orchestra gets louder and louder until their ears start to bleed.

Here we go with the first acting award, Jennifer Connelly, looking like a CEO of a cosmetics company, is giving out Best Supporting Actor. Go Chris Walken!! Okay, she just said that there have been 66 Best Supporting Actors in the 75 years of the awards and "Here are some of those award-winning faces." Well, I counted, and they showed 63 of them. What do they have against those last three? How much longer would it have made the show? Who made the executive decision that only 63 would fit into the montage and not one more? Did they not kiss enough ass? Really, I am curious.

Since when did it become de rigueur to clap for yourself when they call your name? Usually one is crass enough to do it, but this time all four did it! And maybe Newman did as well from his living room where we couldn't see them.

Chris Cooper wins. I did want my boyfriend Walken to get it, but Cooper was astonishing in Adaptation, and I cannot complain.

There's Jennifer Lopez, wearing an outfit that my mother wore in 1973. Ooh, her home-girl roots just showed all over the country when she said "mou-ains" for "mountains". O no she di-int!

Everyone is so shiny, is powdering your nose and forehead out, makeup-wise these days?

Get to the stage, guys. The art director and set decorator of Chicago seem to feel the need to make out with every single actor involved in the movie before getting their damn awards. Call my name at the Oscars, man, and I'd knock anyone in my way down in my sprint to the stage, including my mother. You can kiss everyone later.

John Travolta is on early in the evening this year, I seem to recall thinking that he and Sharon Stone were a little loaded last year, and that they were on rather late in the broadcast. They're not making that mistake twice.

There are Catherine Zeta-Jones and Latifah singing the nominated song from Chicago, you know, the one that nobody remembers hearing in the movie. They always do that with musicals, write a new song nothing like as good as the rest of the songs so that it an be nominated for an Oscar, and maybe it will win because the voters will think that they are voting for one of the other, better songs.

Um, why are they re-running the footage of Chris Cooper winning his Oscar? It was only five minutes ago, we all remember it clearly enough without needing to have our memories jogged.

Jennifer Garner is wearing a colour! A bright colour! Is that not against the rules of Life During Wartime? Blacks and dulls only, I'm certain that that was what the memo said. Stone the frivolous bitch!!

Who the hell is doing Mickey Mouse's voice? I mean, it's not as distinctive as Donald's, but that doesn't mean that we don't know what it's supposed to sound like. Stone the impostor mouse! Not to mention the fact that poor Jennifer only got to say about two words, the impostor mouse had all of the lines. I'm sure that the gift basket made it all worthwhile.

Ah, for the next category, Best Live-Action Short, she gets to do all of the talking. Though they all seem to be foreign films, and for half of them she only read the English version of the title. Chicken!

Is that man in a pink velvet tux or have I gone completely crackers?

Mira Sorvino is having a little difficulty with the word "aesthetically". God, that must be every reasonably intelligent actress' nightmare, stumbling over a long word in front of a billion people and having everyone think that you really are the dim-bulb bimbo that you won your Oscar playing.

Chicago wins for Best Costumes. So far that's two, will it be a sweep? There are clearly too many damn Chicago people on the aisle because again there is the stopping and the kissing and the having long conversations at every single row. This might get old.

Paul Simon is singing his nominated song, another one that nobody has ever heard of, but as opposed to the Chicago selection, it's really good. Obviously. I mean, it's by Paul Simon, so what else could it be?

Nia Vardolos is presenting Best Makeup. Will it be The Time Machine for the pounds and pounds of Morlock makeup slathered all over every extra in sight or will it be Frida for The Brow? O, I am on tenterhooks! Of course it's The Brow, as though anyone is giving any award to The Time Machine for any reason whatsoever. They are smartly switching off on the speech, practically word by word. That's how to get your time in, take note, nominees.

Sean Connery has either has an immense amount of plastic surgery without trying to look any younger than sixty or he has stopped time with the force of his will. Knowing him, I'd bet the latter. But what on earth is he wearing? If he is wearing the fluffy shirt that you wear with a kilt why is he wearing tux pants instead? There is nothing manlier than a man in a kilt, I wish he had gone all the way.

Wow, as he ages he has lost the "s" sound altogether. It was always pretty close to "sh" without being there entirely, but he just opened his mouth and said, "Oshcar hash had great reashon to shelebrate over the yearsh." He sounds like somebody's drunken uncle at a wedding reception. Or resheption, as the case may be.

He is giving out Best Supporting Actress. They showed all 66 in the clips this time, no three left discarded, weeping at the side of the road. But why is he giving out the award, normally it would be the Best Supporting Actor from the year before, who was that? O, it was Jim Broadbent. I'm sure he's working overseas or something, I hope it's not that they forgot to invite him, poor dear. Of course, he is in every movie made now, it's the law, so I'm sure he's working.

Catherine Zeta-Jones wins, or as Sean Connery intones, breathily, "Catherine..." One can only imagine that he is remembering the sight of her rather astonishing ass slithering over bits of string in that fetish scene from Entrapment. Of course, these days you could show a Cinemascope movie on her ass, but seeing as she is 9 1/2 months pregnant, that's only to be expected.

One can only imagine that Matthew McConaughey wishes that he could be introduced at the Oscar telecast as something other than the star of How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, but hey, he cashed the checks, he's gotta pay the piper.

Okay, he introduced the clip from Gangs of New York, and then Steve Martin came back to introduce the next presenter, and it is "The star of How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, Kate Hudson!" How much did the makers of How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days pay to have their film title announced twice in a row? Do they think that it will fool anyone into thinking that the movie is good?

Kate looks bored out of her mind. Either that or as though she is trying not to move her face too much to keep from getting wrinkles. Close your eyes and think of England, Kate, or at least that gift basket! That's why I love the new unexpected stars, like Nia Vardolos because they keep expecting it all to go away any minute, so they consistently enjoy each moment to the fullest.

Jesus, Renee Zellwegger is skinny. When your shoulders are that bony you should avoid spaghetti straps, as it rather looks as though her collarbones will slice them in half any minute. She was so much prettier as Bridget Jones! C'mon Renee, you don't have to be as heavy as you were for Bridget, I certainly understand that you would never work in that town again, but surely you are allowed to be not quite so see-through on a general day-to-day basis.

And Frida wins Best Score! Who thought that The Little Movie That Could would not only win an Oscar, but two! It won't win any more, don't start practicing your speech, Salma, but be proud of those two.

Julie Andrews gets a standing ovation. As well she should. Even if she is introducing a clip package of musical numbers from Oscar telecasts past. Dear God. Will Rob Lowe and Snow White be included? Only if they are honest. Heavens. Did I just see Roddy McDowall in full Cornelius makeup tap-dancing? Or was that a hallucination? Ooh, Isaac Hayes, they should just show the whole clip of him singing "Shaft" and forget the rest of it. And no Rob Lowe. For shame.

Holy shit. Salma Hayek may well not win Best Actress (if she does I'll eat my head), but she definitely wins Best Tits. A black lace top with swirly designs that may or may not be see-through is the best choice for any busty woman to wear. I'll be wearing one myself starting tomorrow, it's that flattering.

She is presenting Best Foreign Film, which makes sense, what with her being Foreign and all. You can't put anything by me, Academy, I'm that quick!

What is it with these winners strolling down the as though they can really take or leave the Oscar? I understand the women in their ridiculous shoes going cautiously, but the men have no excuse but sheer laziness. I practically expect them to have a kip in the middle of the aisle halfway down. Again, give me a fucking Oscar, you wouldn't have to play more than one bar of my film's theme music before I hit that mic, panting.

Ooh, that actor from Y Tu Mama Tambien sure is a hottie. He can even get away with wearing an open-collared shirt and no tie at a formal event. You can't say that about many people. He's introducing the song from Frida, presumably to prove that he speaks quite good English but also so that the Spanish names of the performers don't get completely mangled. It's a win-win proposition.

Documentary Feature. As though anything besides Bowling For Columbine has a chance to win. And of course I was right. Are we sure that's Michael Moore? I've never seen him without his baseball cap, it could be a ringer. Ah no, he's talking about the war and the president as no-one else would, it's Michael Moore alright. Whether you agree with his views or not, you can't help but admire his great clanking balls of bronze. He must have to have his trousers especially made.

Documentary Short Subject, unlikely to be as interesting as Documentary Feature, but that was probably the high point of the evening. Twin Towers wins, of course, because just as any documentary about the Holocaust has a better-than-average chance of winning, anything about the WTC will certainly blow away the competition for at least the next decade or so.

Best Cinematography, The Road to Perdition, an easy guess. They always vote for the dead ones. His son is accepting. As a person with a dead father, I feel that I can say that I hate it when people gaze into their eyebrows to indicate that their very own dead father is in the sky somewhere. I realize that it's petty (as though every other word of this entry isn't), but it literally makes me crazy.

This is cute, a little film with Oscar winners talking about what that moment is like when you win. And there's my best beloved Rand saying, "It really touched me, a big rush of, uh, if I had a heart, what would be called emotion!"

Colin Farrell is introducing U2. What an amazing co-incidence, a mick actor introducing a mick band! What are the odds! Goddamn, that's a dull song, though. So far, I'd say that the Paul Simon song is by far the best, but we haven't heard Eminem yet. I'll bet that'll blow the roof off the joint!

Geena Davis no longer dresses like an insane person. I'd say that's a shame, it was always one of the more interesting parts of Oscars past, trying to figure out what the hell she was thinking. Although the blue aviator glasses do give one pause.

Hey! Hey!! I've been robbed!! Geena Davis just said:

"A Russian czar once asked an artist, 'How did you carve such a remarkable likeness of me out of a block of granite?' and the sculptor replied, 'I chipped away everything that did not look like your highness.' So it is with film editors. They receive miles of film from a director and they snip away everything that does not look like the movie they're looking for."

Well, two and a half years ago in this entry I said:

"Editing is incredible. I thought that it would be interesting, but tedious in a way, but it wasn't, it was like treasure hunting, or sculpting. You know how they say that in order to sculpt a bird, you take a piece of marble and chip away everything that isn't a bird. Well, editing a movie is chipping away everything that isn't the movie. Finding the story in the different angles and takes."

Either somebody has been peeking or I'm not nearly as original a thinker that I consider myself to be, and I refuse to accept that it might be the latter.

Boy, Susan Sarandon just gets sexier and sexier the older she gets. She must have a painting hidden away in the attic not aging, but getting really dumpy.

They did the Parade of the Dead, and then Steve Martin said "Later we're doing a montage of People You Think Are Dead, But Aren't."

"Now Halle Berry is here, whose win last year broke down barriers for unbelievably hot women. Now at least they have hope!" Steve, can you please put your tongue back in your own mouth? The woman is married, you really don't have much of a chance at her! Admittedly, in that dress I'd fuck her myself, but your naked need is getting a little unseemly, dear heart.

They are doing Best Actor already? At the 2 hour and 18 minute mark? They really are trying to keep everyone all on their toes, aren't they. Hmm, I counted 75 actors in the Best Actor clip fest. Either there was once a tie or, um, I miscounted. Aha! There was a tie in 1932! My omnipotence reigns unshattered.

Holy fuck! Adrien Brody won Best Actor! Who the hell expected that to happen? I doubt even Adrien's own mother thought he had a chance! It was a spectacular performance, I'm so thrilled. And the best bit is seeing all of the other nominees being genuinely thrilled for him and clapping their little hands off.

And then he laid a great big smacker of a kiss on Halle Berry. He must think that he is in a dream, and when you are in a dream you might as well make out with any movie star that wanders through brandishing an Oscar with your name on it! Halle seemed to enjoy the lip-lock herself. I guess when those "Adrien Brody is a big stud" rumours start spreading, we'll know who started them.

"There comes a time in life when everything seems to make sense. This is not one of those times." He brought his agent as his date? That's rather charming. Or sad that he doesn't have a girlfriend, but I'm sure they'll be lining up around the block after seeing That Kiss. (read afterwards that it's his mother, not his agent, but since they put the camera on her when he mentioned his agent, and he seemed to be indicating her, it was a reasonable error on my part.)

Hey, they are giving out Best Song without Eminem performing? What's up with that? Well, I guess if he wasn't going to do it himself for whatever reason, they certainly couldn't have anyone else do it. And I guess if they thought that if they played a tape of it and had some dancers bounce off the walls instead that it would end up a laughingstock, like when Ann Reinking sang and danced to "Against All Odds instead of Phil Collins that one year. He didn't sing it, I mean. One would only hope that he would have refrained from doing the dancing bit.

O my God, Eminem won! Two big shocks in a row! I mean, I love Eminem and I think it's certainly the best song, but who the hell expected the Academy to recognize that fact? This show is getting really peculiar at the time in the telecast when normally all of the front-runners start scooping up their awards.

And there's Cameron Diaz, showing why you really shouldn't chew gum and play with your hair at an awards show. Because you will get on camera and you will look like an eighth grade dropout Wal-Mart cashier with a bad makeover who accidentally wandered into the Kodak Theatre on Oscar night.

Peter O'Toole is getting an honourary award. I adore him with all of my heart. I once wrote a paper in college about how completely ridiculous it is that he never won an Oscar. Christ, he looks as though he doesn't have that many years left. He's about the last of that hard-living bunch still alive, Harris and Ollie Reed and them, and the years have not been that kind to him, even though I think he quit drinking some decades ago. Actually, though I just looked him up and he's 70 years old, so perhaps he's not that worn away for his age.

And now it's Best Actress. Will it be another shock? Will Salma win after all? I don't know that my nerves can take it! Ah no, it's Nicole and the nose putty rather than Salma and The Brow. So we are back to the front runner portion of the evening. Honestly, what is with that sumo hairstyle for heaven's sake? Not to mention the eyebrows plucked to make her look either evil or like a Vulcan. Will she remember to thank Virginia Woolf? Nope. But she said that she wanted to make her mother and her daughter proud. Apparently her father and son can go screw.

Olivia de Havilland is introducing The Parade of the Living, i.e. all of the past Oscar winners that had nothing else to do that evening. She looks rather like the winner of a Barbara Bush look-alike contest, but hey, live well into your eighties and look that good and fuck 'em all, that's what I say.

I know what this is, it's what Steve Martin said an hour ago, "Later we're doing a montage of People You Think Are Dead, But Aren't." I mean, Red Buttons is still alive? Who knew?

Boy howdy, George Chakiris sure aged badly. I think he went to Robert Blake's plastic surgeon--he looks oddly smooth and sunken-eyed in the upper facial area. I forgot that Cuba Gooding Jr. won an Oscar. They should take it away from him for doing that appalling fag boat movie that is just coming out, we won't even mention Snow Dogs II. Christ, it's that kid from The Yearling! They really dug out from under every rock for this year's Parade of the Living if they are even including the kiddie Oscars.

Jennifer Jones is still alive? Dear Lord, Karl Malden looks like he'll be in next year's Parade of the Dead. My father looks perkier and he died in 1997. Shit, he's 91, I guess the fact that he's ambulatory at all deserves applause. Hayley Mills! Cool! And there's Rita Moreno, showing that she's still pretty amazing looking when she's not dressed down as the nun in Oz. O, and there's Meggie O'Brien, looking a little scary, but it's nice to see her invited to the party.

Tatum O'Neal didn't think that the Oscars were important enough for her to get her roots done? Luise Rainer! Now there is the queen of the "Still Alive" list, good for her! She's 93, and she looks like one of those old birds that you couldn't kill with a stick. And there's Mickey Rooney, after the set-up that Steve Martin gave him three hours ago. Jesus, Maximilian Schell looks astoundingly good at 72. He's another Sean Connery, totally sexy no matter the age. Fuck me, Teresa Wright! Wow! This thing takes forever, but it's nice that they didn't rush it, that everyone gets their moment on camera.

Richard Gere and his fabulous hair is pretty lucky that he didn't have to sing a nominated song tonight, because it sounds like he has a hell of a cold.

What is with all of the one-shouldered dresses tonight? I mean, they are nice, but it looks as though all of these actresses have been attacked by a mad slasher backstage and managed to get away with everything but their clothing intact.

Best Adapted Screenplay, The Pianist. It would have been nice to see a fictional character win an Oscar (Adaptation), and personally I think that The Hours should have won because that book must have been a complete bitch to adapt, but The Pianist is glorious, who could fault this win?

Best Original Screenplay, listen to Ben Affleck with the Spanish girlfriend pronouncing all of the names right for Talk to Her and Y Tu Mama Tambien! He knows she'd give him his ring back if he didn't. And holy crap, Almodovar won! Why do they say it is his first Oscar, he won for foreign film a couple of years ago, I remember that he appeared to be completely insane. I am quite startled! I expected Nia Vardolos to get the infamous performing dog vote, meaning that any actor that writes anything gets a prize simply for knowing the alphabet, let along writing a half-decent script using said alphabet.

Harrison Ford looks as though he'd like to kill the orchestra for playing the theme from Star Wars. He is presenting Best Director. O my God, Roman Polanski won! I love the fact that the first person on his feet was Martin Scorsese. I mean, he's a real movie lover, he knows how much Polanski deserves recognition. I was waiting to hear what Harrison said, and he managed to not say, "Roman Polanski was unable to be with us this evening..." I'm not certain that I would have had the self-control.

I love the way Kirk Douglas has no fear of talking in public, post-stroke, and making fun of himself and his slurred speech. He shows that his mind hasn't lost a single step, not one bit.

Now who is going to win Best Picture? The only way anything could be more surprising is if something not actually nominated managed to win. And it's Chicago! As Steve Martin said at the top of the show, "I'm just being honest here, Miramax stopped at nothing to make sure that Chicago was nominated. Now here's what they did, and you tell me if you think this is fair. They made a really good movie that everybody likes! Well, if you're gonna do that..."

"We're finally at the halfway mark!" thank you Steve, for the rolling out of the traditional joke. It wouldn't be the Oscars without it.

This is the most insane Oscars ever, between Adrien Brody and Eminem and Almodovar and Roman Polanski, the least likely people will be winning Oscar pools throughout the nation.

Today's horoscope:
This may not be the best day to discard nonessential possessions. It's hard to be relaxed and focused when surrounded by people who are neither. No matter what your results, you get an 'A' for effort.

One year ago today:
I clutched the back of the seat in front of me, and we all three stiffened when that last high note was hit, making eyeballs bleed as far away as Trenton.

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Last Updated Thurs 27 March 00:20:09 2003