RE: Oscar diary
[{"sender": "Stephanie", "recipients": ["Peggy Siegal 2<Vacation@gmail.com]"], "timestamp": "3/4/2011 11:15:40 PM", "subject": "RE: Oscar diary", "body": "Jeffrey,\nPeggy's story is attached to the e-mail. I have included the story in the body of the e-mail as well.\nThanks,\n\nStephanie\n\nOmar Quadhafi is hunkering down in Tripoli giving press interviews denying that rebels are taking over\nEastern Libya. Oi] prices are shooting over one hundred dollars a barrel. The US government is on the\nverge of a shut down. These are not the top secret opening lines to Aaron Sorkin’s new script, but the\nglobal headlines of a world spinning out of control. I head to Los Angeles like an overdressed lemming to\nattend the 83rd Academy Awards and attempt to make sense of artists thrust into combat.\n\nFor the second year nearly 6,000 Academy members have nominated 10 films and the battle is down to two.\nThe beloved timeless classic, \"The King's Speech\" marches into the arena as the front runner, but\npassionate supporters of the brilliant edgier (and critics darling) \"The Social Network\" have not\nconceded. The ballots are counted, the party invites are out and still the feelings are raw. Filmmakers\nare exhausted from campaigning.\n\nAt Bryan Lourd's famous star studded party Sony Classics’ Co-President Michael Barker announces to me he\nhas taken a random sampling of voters in the room. He says, \"There will be a ‘Social Network’ upset at\nthe Kodak Theater.\" Shear panic radiates from my every pore as he says, \"I am joking.\" It's like color\nwar at summer camp.\n\nwoody Allen and George Lucas tell me they are no longer members of the Academy because pitting artists\nagainst each other to determine the quality of their work is insane. They are right.\n\nMy event and publicity company is considered \"Switzerland\" by the studios, as we help every filmmaker to\npresent and position his work. This year I am somewhat emotionally sucked in.\n\nIn 2005 I meet the unknown 32-year-old English director Tom Hooper on his first film for HBO,\"Elizabeth\nI\". The Emmy award winning movie stars Helen Mirren, who takes credit for discovering him directing\nEnglish television. Helen later wins her Oscar for portraying Queen Elizabeth in “The Queen”. Queen\nElizabeth is the daughter of King George VI portrayed by Oscar winner Colin Firth in “The King's Speech\".\n\nI also become Hooper's champion encouraging many to see his early work including his herculean 10 hour\nHBO mini-series \"John Adams\" produced by Tom Hanks.\n\nSix years later at the Telluride Film Festival Tom Hooper is bathing in the glory of a hysterical\nstanding ovation with Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush at the very first screening of \"The King's Speech.”\nSurprisingly, this drama's subtle humor gets big laughs leading up to its emotional ending.\n\nwithin two weeks, at The Toronto Film Festival, Harvey Weinstein is now standing with his filmmakers\nwitnessing the same reaction. The film wins The Audience Prize. Their strategy is to say nothing. Do\nnothing. They have a possible Oscar winner. Four out of five past Best Pictures have premiered in\nToronto.\n\ncut to New York City at the end of September. It's the opening night at The Film Society of Lincoln\ncenter. One of America’s most important and prolific producers Scott Rudin, along with Jesse Eisenberg,\nAndrew Garfield and Aaron Sorkin are in a brightly lit box waving down to their equally hysterical\naudience who have just seen \"The Social Network\".\n\nThe film opens the next day to rave reviews and endless publicity. David Fincher is off making “The Girl\nwith the Dragon Tattoo\". Aaron Sorkin becomes the face of the film and an immediate shoo-in for an Oscar.\n\nThe Hamptons International Film Festival in October suddenly becomes a launching pad for \"127 Hours\",\nwhere cool Yale/NYU student James Franco appears and receives a heroic standing ovation. More Oscar buzz.\n\n“Black Swan\" also unspools there in a tiny theater as Madonna, Alec Baldwin and even Harvey Weinstein\n\nslip in the back. Darren Aronofsky, sporting the ever present cool wool scarf around his neck is hailed a\ngenius. Natalie Portman is instantly the hot nominee for Best Actress."}]