The 2016 Academy Awards

The nominated movies of 2015 were a strange mix and pretty downbeat, so why shouldn’t the Oscars be weird? It’s fun when there’s a little mystery involved with the awards, there’s a mix, and we don’t have a whole sweep. That gets boring.

Chris Rock was an excellent host. He came right out and kicked #OscarsSoWhite right in the teeth. (Is that why he wore a white dinner jacket in February?)

“I’m here at the Oscars, otherwise known as the White People’s Choice Awards. If they nominated hosts, I wouldn’t even be here right now. Y’all would be watching Neil Patrick Harris.”

If it sounded loud, looked amazing and was put together in a great and weird way, it was one of six Oscars for Mad Max: Fury Road. That film was the only one that came close to a sweep.

Mark Rylance won a somewhat surprising Supporting Actor for Bridge of Spies after many expected a Sylvester Stallone win for Creed. Alicia Vikander won for Supporting Actress in The Danish Girl.

Brie Larson followed through the awards season with an expected Best Actress win for Room. Leonardo DiCaprio did the same, winning Best Actor for The Revenant after six previous nominations. He made an impassioned speech about the environment without becoming political.

Best Director went to Alejandro G. Iñárritu for The Revenant. It was his fourth win and his second in a row.

Best Picture went to Spotlight. (Yay, it was the one I was rooting for!)

In 2015 there were not exactly feel-good movies. Come on, Hollywood, laugh a little!

Award Shows: Road To The Oscars

The 2015 Academy Awards should be exciting, because 2014 was a great movie year. Strangely, some really top competitors squeaked through so late in the year that we saw them in the theater in 2015. That has happened in previous years as well. In 2012, “Lincoln” was released on November 16, and “Django Unchained” was released on December 25.

The award shows leading up to the Oscars often show us whether the Las Vegas odds are correct. Yes, there’s some serious money on the nominees. But there’s a downside to being an awards junkie like me. It means you’ve sat through the People’s Choice Awards.

This year the People’s Choice Awards show was painfully cheesy. Because they precede every award with the word “favorite,” they managed to make the one and only elegant moment of the evening awkward. Ben Affleck received “Favorite Humanitarian” award for his creation of the Eastern Congo Initiative. (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/peoples-choice-awards-ben-afflecks-761722) Are there humanitarians we don’t like?

Then there are the Golden Globe Awards and the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards. In 2012 SAG merged with AFTRA – The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists – so the SAG awards became SAG/AFTRA, representing TV as well as movies.

It gets to be more fun as it goes along. Maybe the same person wins in the supporting category…maybe a person’s seat gets closer to the stage…maybe there’s a surprise winner who has to navigate down staircases and around tables as music plays because no one ever thought he’d/she’d win.

George Clooney once said the Golden Globes were the most fun because he could sit at a nice table and drink, and his Supporting Actor award was the first one presented.

The red carpet is fun but of course should not be watched in real time: You must be able to fast-forward past inane conversations and ugly fashions. You should decide the best and worst fashions for yourself, largely based on the presenters. And no, it’s not fun to hope someone trips on the stage or on the stairs. Jennifer Lawrence tripped and made a graceful recovery. Then she accepted an Academy Award! It could have been worse.

If we think we know who’ll win in advance, the problem with a “sure thing” is this: The Golden Globes (http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/11/showbiz/feat-2015-golden-globes-winners-list/) gave out more awards than you’ll see at the Oscars. You saw two Best Actor awards, for comedy (Michael Keaton) and drama (Eddie Redmayne). It’s such a tight race for the Academy Award, and those two are the ones who, frankly, deserve it.

Similarly, the SAG Awards (http://variety.com/2015/film/news/sag-award-winners-2015-screen-actors-guild-awards-winner-list-1201414657/) didn’t award best picture; they awarded “best cast.” That was Birdman. The Golden Globes awarded comedy and drama separately and had two winners: The Grand Budapest Hotel and Boyhood. Best Picture is a big question.

The winners we heard repeatedly were Julianne Moore for Best Actress, Patricia Arquette for Best Supporting Actress, and J.K. Simmons for Best Supporting Actor. But so many other awards are up for grabs. That’s where the fun comes in. Who can be really sure?

Herbie Hancock’s Memoir

If you’re too young or never heard of Herbie Hancock (shown here with Morgan Freeman at the UN International Jazz Day), you should get to know this giant in jazz. He has written a memoir, Herbie Hancock: Possibilities with author Lisa Dickey, to be released on October 28. The title evokes his 2005 album of the same name — his forty-fifth. In addition to winning 14 Grammy Awards since 1984, he won an Academy Award in 1986 for the soundtrack to Round Midnight. His 2007 tribute album River: The Joni Letters won the 2008 Grammy Award for Album of the Year, only the second jazz album ever to win the award. In 2013 he received the Kennedy Center Honors Award.

According to Jazz Times, currently Hancock serves as Creative Chair for Jazz for the Los Angeles Philharmonic Association and as Institute Chairman of the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz. He is also a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador. He was named the 2014 Norton Professor Of Poetry at Harvard University, and conducted a lecture series, “The Ethics Of Jazz,” as part of the Charles Eliot Norton Lecture Series in February for a period of six weeks.

Hancock never studied jazz. His early education was in classical music, starting at the age of seven. At eleven he played Mozart with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. When he fell in love with jazz, he made an extraordinary name for himself, part of the Miles Davis Quintet, and worked with Wayne Shorter, Chick Corea, The Headhunters, V.S.O.P., Jaco Pastorius and Joni Mitchell.

In 2010 Hancock released The Imagine Project. He appears on the fifth Flying Lotus album, You’re Dead, to be released in October.