DivaLea: Oscars I: I Sleep Through It

Hey ho, Curve Cadets. Lea Hernandez here, relatively fresh back from Katsucon 2005(and an ass-whipping win at Katsu's Iron Artist match with co-Ironer Fred Perry.

I say "relatively fresh", because I'm still trying (and failing) to get eight hours of restful sleep, so I decided to sleep through the Oscars this year. It's the first time since Lou Rawls sang, "I've got a tale to tell you, baby," that I've taken a pass. I've seen Anne Reinking butcher Phil Collins in song and interpretive dance. I've seen Paula Abdul get the (wrongful) blame for the horrific 1990 production numbers. (She didn't make the decision to put tap-dancing scuba divers in the "Kiss the Girl/Under the Sea" production number.) I've seen Nell Carter dressed as a Genie running away from extras whilst singing "Friend Like Me."
Maybe that's why "Heaven's Light/Hellfire" didn't get a nomination for Best Song in 1997: there was no pay high enough to get dancers to dress as symbolically vagina-hooded monks. Maybe it's Tony Jay's made-for-radio face.


Tony Jay, man of one sexy voice and a thousand roles, huurrrrrr. Undated publicity photo.

Watching the Oscar pre-show with Star Jones in her ill-fitting dress (just 'cause it zips don't mean it fits, homegirl) toss celebrity salad on the red carpet was making me want to kill my TV and made me wish I was back on Zoloft. This made me firm in my wavering decision to skip the Oscars. I'm like an inertia-locked reader of a comic long past its prime: I keep watching, refusing to accept the badness, hoping it will get better. I decided to break free, and had some ice cream, and went to sleep. I had King wake me up on his trips to the bathroom to give me highlights to add to my own impressions. Here they are:

Best and Worst Dress was won for the first time by a single dress: Hilary Swank's coccoon that was Church Lady front and J-Lo back.

Chris Rock made a stupid joke about Penelope Cruz' and Salma Hayak's breasts, something like "the next four presenters".
Note to Rock: when a girl works that hard to get into a dress, spackle on enough makeup to last seven hours, get her hair done, and make high-level decisions about panty line or no, she does NOT need to hear a joke about her tits. Besides, fuckle, if it's a joke about boobs, and there are two girls on the stage, that's SIX presenters, not four, unless you know something about a mastectomy the rest of us don't. (Unless, of course, Rock just considers Cruz and Hayak mere exoskeletons that carry around their breasts.) When Robin Williams and Marc (South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut) Shaiman don't get to musically yank James Dobson's crank, Rock doesn't get to make bad-math boob jokes.

Edna Mode and Pierce Brosnan presented the costuming Oscar together.

Million Dollar Mercy Killing won Best Picture. That means Chariots of White Men has company on the "DivaLea will never watch it" Best Picture Award movie list.

The Incredibles won the "It's not Important if It's not Live Action", I mean, Best Animated Picture Award.

Yes, this is possibly the suckiest Oscar report ever, and even the reference to anal-oral sex can't spice it up. But wait, I have a whole 'nother one on Brad Bird and shunting animated films to the kids' table at Movie Thanksgiving.