I watched the Oscars on Sunday. Apparently not too many people did. Probably because it's usually in March: what the hell?
They got to the memoriam, and by the end I was quite upset. Not because of who they mentioned, but because of who they didn't. That's right, Brad Renfro. My mother claimed that the list was sort of a number of people who'd died last year, but I don't know about that.
When he died, I checked out Access Hollywood, which my mother usually has on while she eats dinner. I was waiting for them to say something, but they never did. A slew of weeks later, the same show released what turned out to be Mr. Renfro's last interview. He looked rough and bloated. He talked about how he hoped people would remember him as a great actor. It was very sad. Afterwards, the video was outtroed with an alarming coldness. "Yeah, he got all fucked up on drugs, now he's dead, let's move on." I'm barely exaggerating. They wouldn't curse on network television, of course.
I don't know. It seems like it's a thing. Why? I really don't understand this, but it's definitely standing in stark relief against, you know, the treatment of that other fellow who died recently.
Parenthetical: (I have nothing against Heath Ledger, nor the outpouring of grief for him. I was honestly not upset by his passing, but I don't mean that to be a remark on him, and any anger or negativity I have is not directed at him. It's merely frustration at this ... thing. Mr. Ledger just happened to die. It's not his fault.)
Seriously, is it just me?
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Not just you, no. Chris was asking me if I knew whether the list was in order of death, and after Suzanne Pleshette popped up in the middle (before Deborah Kerr), I said that it couldn't be as she should be sandwiched between Brad Renfro and Heath Ledger. And then, suddenly, there was Heath Ledger and the end. I couldn't believe they left him out.
They also left out Roy Scheider. I have an almost-explanation. There were dates on the screen at the beginning (indicating they were listing only people who died within those dates). Roy Scheider died after the end date. But--so did Heath Ledger. My best guess is they knew they couldn't leave out Ledger--and really, that's correct, they just couldn't--and so made a 'Ledger exception'. But that exception was a one-off, and so didn't apply to Scheider or Renfro. Note I'm not claiming that this makes sense.
In other news, why did Tilda Swinton leave the house wearing either a giant hefty bag or one of her home's velvet drapes?
Kirk - the dates were given as February 1, 2007 - January 31, 2008.
Mr. Renfro died on January 15. Mr. Ledger died on January 22.
Ah. I wasn't able to read exactly what the dates were. That being the case, it explains the non-inclusion of Scheider (though that's still lame) and the inclusion of Ledger. And brings us back to leaving Renfro off the list for no good reason. This won't satisfy anyone, but most likely it was simply an oversight. There was at least one other mistake; an African director was included (unfamiliar to me) and apparently they mixed up his first name and last name.
A final point: Ingmar Bergman deserved his own spot, not just his allotted eight seconds. A giant is a giant (no slight intended toward any of the others).
Well, Bergman did get the loudest applause, plus some cheers and whistles.
I read (can't remember where) that Renfro's exclusion was not an oversight. The reasoning was, "We have a limited amount of time and can't include everyone who died last year, and we want to include people from all aspects of the industry and not just actors, so some actors are inevitably going to get left off."
I don't get why they couldn't include everyone. The Oscars are 3 plus hours long anyway. It's going to take an extra, what, 5 seconds per person who died? I'm sure if they had wanted to, they could cut a montage or two.
They also excluded Vonnegut. (Not really Hollywood material, I know, but several of his works have been made into movies, so they could've.)
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