Oscar Surprise

The year was 1952. Oscar was in big trouble. Talk swirled around the backlots and boardrooms of Hollywood that the Academy Awards was on its last legs. The problem was money.

Back then, the studios financed the Academy of Motion Pictures, and the studio system was crumbling. Hollywood was changing the way it did business, and studios were losing their "stables" of stars to the free agent system. An invention called television was keeping Americans in their living rooms and out of the movie theaters.

The Academy had just one choice: make peace with the enemy. It was an ironic turn of events that would lead to more shocking surprises at the Oscars.

That year, a desperate NBC shelled out US$100,000 for the television rights to the awards ceremony. Not everyone felt that this was a good idea. "Television?" cracked Bob Hope. "That's where old movies go when they die."

But in true Hollywood tradition, the show went on. That first televised ceremony was filled with upsets and surprises. Shirley Booth trumped both Joan Crawford and Bette Davis in the best actress category for her luminous performance in Come Back, Little Sheba. An absent John Ford made history with a fourth best director nod. More importantly, though, the night set another precedent: it ran too long.

Now, everyone in the nation could witness the action as if they themselves were there. And stars, being stars, were well aware of their expanded audience. Acceptance speeches got a little longer, fashion a little more outlandish, and drama a little more dramatic. Which also made everything a little more fun.

It didn't take long for the evening to push the boundaries of taste. During a 1958 production number, people at home raised their eyebrows as Rock Hudson and Mae West delivered a randy rendition of "Baby, It's Cold Outside." At song's end, Hudson hinted at his manly prowess, offering West a cigarette and purring, "King-sized." To this, West saucily quipped, "It's not the men in your life; it's the life in your men." The two then exchanged an uncomfortably long and passionate smooch.

Not all of the televised controversy would be so lighthearted.

From the 1960s onward, Oscar's podium became a political pulpit. Jane Fonda, one of Hollywood's staunchest political activists, prompted groans with every appearance. Attending her first ceremony as a nominee for 1970's They Shoot Horses, Don't They?, the mink-swathed star climbed from her limousine and greeted crowds with a Black Panther salute. Nearly ten years later, she accepted her best actress prize for Coming Home with a speech begun in sign language, in honor of the deaf.

The hearing-impaired got even more recognition at the 1977 ceremony. As Debby Boone crooned her Oscar-nominated ballad, "You Light Up My Life," 11 young people signed beside her. The production number proved more infuriating than inspiring when published reports blew the whistle on the ids, reporting that they weren't deaf at all, and worse, that they were "signing" mumbo-jumbo.

Even this faux pas was easily eclipsed that year by the controversy surrounding Vanessa Redgrave. Outside the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, roughly 200 Palestinians rallied in support of Redgrave for her work on the documentary The Palestinians, while some 20 Jewish Defense League members burned her in effigy, carrying signs proclaiming "Vanessa Is a Murderer."

Inside, Redgrave accepted a best supporting actress statuette for her gripping portrayal of a Nazi fighter in Julia. The British actress gave a lengthy diatribe, at one point thanking the Academy for recognizing her despite "the threats of a small bunch of Zionist hoodlums." The crowd gasped; some booed. Later, writer Paddy Chayefsky chastised her to much applause: "I am sick and tired of people exploiting the Academy Awards for the propagation of their own personal propaganda."

Still, most memorable in the lore of Oscar controversy is Marlon Brando's 1973 acceptance of an award for The Godfather. In his place, he sent a Native American woman, Sacheen Littlefeather, dressed in white buckskin and leather headdress, to read a speech blasting Hollywood for its film treatment of Native Americans. Amid awkward silence followed by disgruntled murmurs, the tiny woman finished Brando's rant. Later, "Littlefeather" was discovered to be an actress masquerading as an Apache.

Other speeches, though less politically charged, were equally embarrassing. In 1979, Shirley MacLaine used her podium time to cheer up her sibling, Warren Beatty, who had just lost for Heaven Can Wait. "I want to take this opportunity to say how proud I am of my little brother... Just imagine what you could accomplish if you tried celibacy!" Cut to the renowned lothario slumping uncomfortably in his seat, next to his equally uneasy date, Diane Keaton.

Of course, not all Oscar attendees showed up with an embarrassing agenda. In fact, in the 1970s, a whole bunch of them didn't show up at all. Oscar backlash was in vogue, with many stars shunning the awards.

Dustin Hoffman, for one, not only skipped the 1969 and 1974 ceremonies for his Midnight Cowboy and Lenny nominations, he called the awards"obscene, dirty, and grotesque – no better than a beauty contest."

Five years later, the diminutive star showed a change of heart, striding up to the podium he once cursed and accepting his best actor Oscar for Kramer vs. Kramer. He even gave a goofy acceptance speech: "I'd like to thank my mother and father for not practicing birth control," he gushed.

The 1990s have been a decade of taste. The speeches continue to be long-winded, but the circus atmosphere has been kept to three rings. While everyone loved to complain about the excesses in previous years, this newfound dignity is almost a little disappointing.

Still, the Oscars have lways been a suspense-heady evening of sequins, surprises, and sometimes, less than sportsmanlike behavior. And with the advent of TV, it became a Big Event. Movies, after all, are inherently about drama and spectacle.

Back to Oscar And Felix

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The Full Nominees List
Dressed For Success
L.A. Reverential

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Written by Alicia Potter with graphic design by Dana Byerly