Profile: The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Chris Rock, host of this Sunday's Oscars ceremony, is bound to shake up some of the stuffy characters who make up the academy, writes Donald Clarke
Over the last few weeks the loudmouthed comedian Chris Rock, host of the 77th Oscars ceremony, which takes place tomorrow night in Los Angeles, has been trying the patience of his employers at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. After describing the event as a "fashion show" (as if!), Rock went on to suggest that the only people likely to tune in were gay, white men.
Gil Cates, the producer of the show, speaking through teeth gritted so tightly that his words were barely audible, tried hard to make light of the controversy. "Chris's comments over the past few weeks are meant to be humorous digs at the show that some people, obviously including Chris himself, think may be a bit too stuffy," he said.
The academy's awkward attempts to appear down with the kids by laughing along with this rude, young whippersnapper (although Rock is 40 years old) suggest a middle-aged dad jitterbugging arhythmically to the latest death-metal tune at his offspring's birthday party. The organisation has rarely managed to tune itself into the zeitgeist. Think back to the embarrassing attempt to turn Isaac Hayes's Theme from Shaft, nominated for Best Song in 1971, into a full-scale production number. Muse upon the open hostility that greeted Bert Schneider and Peter Davis, victors in 1975 for their documentary Hearts and Minds, when they brandished a telegram from the provisional revolutionary government of Vietnam. And let's not start on Vanessa Redgrave.
Such incidents have led some commentators to denounce the academy as a cabal of reactionary old buffoons in bath chairs. In truth, the organisation's make-up is too diverse to characterise easily. Among the 6,570 members we find directors, cinematographers, producers, editors and even, quite chillingly, some 358 public relations specialists. But by far the largest branch comprises 1,321 actors - is this why thespian-friendly films such as Shakespeare in Love do so well?
The academy had its origins at a dinner party hosted by Louis B. Mayer, founder of MGM, at his Santa Monica home in 1927. Mayer suggested forming a new organisation to help mediate in labour disputes and to assist the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America, monitor of the now much-derided Hays Code, in its campaign to sanitise the movies. The founders further proposed that the academy, which only the most distinguished figures in the industry would be invited to join, should bestow annual "awards of merit for distinctive achievement".
It quickly became clear that, far from being a democratic professional body, the academy was almost entirely controlled by Mayer and his fellow studio heads. Frank Capra, the director of It's a Wonderful Life and It Happened One Night, who was one of the body's first presidents, has suggested that by the mid-1930s directors, writers and actors were all withdrawing their support. "The academy had become the favourite whipping boy of Hollywood," he said. "The odds were 10 to 1 it would fold and the Oscar would acquire the patina of a collector's item." Academy historians credit Capra, whose famous optimism was balanced by a streak of bloody-mindedness, with restoring the organisation's respectability.
SOMEWHERE ALONG THE way the academy's roles as labour mediator and guardian of decency were downgraded. A cursory glance at the current mission statement on the body's website - and a glance is all you will manage before the corporate cuddle-speak sends your sleepy forehead crashing to the keyboard - reveals that the academy aims "to advance the arts and sciences of motion pictures; foster co-operation among creative leaders for cultural, educational and technological progress; recognise outstanding achievements; cooperate on technical research and improvement of methods and equipment . . ." and so on. Although the organisation's excellent archival work should be acknowledged, it's that phrase about recognising outstanding achievements that stands out amid the waffle.
The initial Academy Awards ceremony, during which 15 thin statuettes were handed out, took place in the Blossom Room of the Hollywood Roosevelt hotel on May 16th, 1929. It seems the word Oscar was first used in this context by Hollywood columnist Sidney Skolsky in 1934, but, though everyone still quotes the story about academy librarian Margaret Herrick likening the trophy to her (Nude? Gold? Sword-wielding?) Uncle Oscar, the origins of the nickname remain in doubt.
At that first ceremony, in a peculiar compromise, the Award for Best Film was shared between the flying epic Wings, now remembered solely as, well, the first film to win a Best Picture Oscar, and F.W. Murnau's dreamlike masterpiece, Sunrise. Critics have suggested that, ever since, when confronted with a contest between a Wings (commercial, populist) and a Sunrise (novel, artistically challenging), the academy has gently tacked towards the mainstream. Thus Citizen Kane lost out to How Green Was My Valley, Apocalypse Now fell to Kramer Vs Kramer and Vertigo wasn't even nominated in the year Gigi won.
Understandably, debate has continued to rage as to just who these taste-dictators might be. How exactly do you become a member of the academy? Is it possible to get booted out and, if so, why weren't there mass purges following Roberto Benigni's victory for the execrable Life is Beautiful?
TO JOIN, YOU must be invited by a standing member of the society - though those nominated for an Oscar receive an automatic invitation - and then have your membership ratified by a simple majority of the 42 members of the board of governors. For your $250 annual dues you get a membership card, a newsletter and access to year-round movie screenings.
Since there are 6,570 members and the Kodak Theatre, home to the Oscars, has only 3,400 seats - half of those taken up by nominees, presenters and guests - academy membership does not guarantee access to the ceremony.
Places are awarded on a lottery basis to those voting members who wish to attend and, until recently, the most common reason for expulsion from the academy was for touting tickets thus acquired. These days, however, the governors are more concerned about members selling on so-called screeners - videotapes and DVDs sent by studios seeking nominations - and last year actor Carmine Caridi was expelled for just such a transgression.
Given that you need to have achieved a certain degree of distinction before becoming a member and that, as long as you pay your dues, membership is for life, it is hardly surprising that the average age of the Academicians is considerably higher than that of the typical cinemagoer. The cosy, lachrymose Finding Neverland, this year's most unlikely nomination for Best Picture, received distinctly lukewarm reviews on release, while Michel Gondry's peculiar, unsettling Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, ignored in that blue-riband event, was greeted by critics with rapturous acclaim. Somehow, however much sex and violence there is about the place, these distinguished old gentlepersons always manage to nominate a film to which you could take your granny.
As noted in this space recently, the 62-year-old Martin Scorsese, director of the ho-hum The Aviator, was largely ignored when he was a tyro, but now that he has become an oak of his generation - the academy's generation - he finds his film nominated for 11 awards and himself the favourite for the Best Director gong. Should he lose, barring the sort of catastrophically unlikely event that leads staunch atheists to question their lack of faith, the even older Clint Eastwood will carry off the award. It makes you think.
Despite all this apparent evidence of favouritism towards the oldies, Steven Gaydos, an executive director of Variety magazine, the entertainment industry's bible, feels the academy's demographic is altering.
"If you had asked me this question a year ago I might have given you a different answer," he says. "But Lord of the Rings winning the top event last year was, to me, a watershed event. That indicated the age has been pulled down a bit. I think the academy has made a real effort to revivify its membership. A recent e-mail went around announcing the candidates for members and I was struck by the number of young actors and film-makers who are joining."
Certainly, bringing in the potty-mouthed Chris Rock as a host - the announcement was, to the undoubted delight of Cates, greeted by yelps of disgust from the same "family" organisations that had hysterics over Janet Jackson's nipple - indicates a desire to inject some needed adrenaline into the ceremony. But it would be a shame if the academy yielded too much ground to the youth market.
"Look, the academy's membership is still older than many would be happy with, but I am not sure that's a bad thing," Gaydos says. "If the voters of the academy are seasoned professionals who have some sense of history and film scholarship and they are voting on the basis of actually knowing something, then that is refreshing, because there are so many executives who are promoted on the basis of not knowing anything. These guys might actually know what they are talking about."