Serendipity

This is such a beautiful image. Sigh, remember?.

From the AP:

OSCAR SHOCK: As Marion Cotillard stepped offstage with the best-actress Oscar for "La Vie En Rose," Forest Whitaker enveloped her in a hug that lasted at least a minute. Then they looked at each other and laughed. "I'm shaking, like wow," Cotillard trembled. Stopping by the backstage "thank you" cam, she expressed her gratitude in French and studied her Oscar. "I'm shaking so much I think I can't talk," she said. Whitaker led her arm-in-arm behind the stage on the winner's walk. "This is huge, this is huge," she gushed as backstage workers applauded. At a stop for a makeup touch up she tried to breathe deeply. "This is crazy, this is totally crazy. Ooh la la la la! It's totally surreal," she said.

Forest

I hope you guys had a lovely Christmas. Here's a snippet I discovered through the Goldderby forums. Roger Friedman was recently talking to Forest Whitaker about the upcoming awards race, and this is what transpired:

"At the screening, I asked Forest Whitaker, slimmed down and refreshed from his Oscar win last winter for "The Last King of Scotland," to whom he expected to hand the Best Actress award in February — assuming we have an Oscar ceremony.

"Marion Cotillard!" he shouted. "Did you not see her in 'La Vie En Rose?' She’s transforming! That’s it!" It’s nice to see someone has an opinion."

Pretty cool, says I. As you might remember, Marion co-starred with Forest in "Mary," a film I've been wanting to see for a long time but which has yet to be released in the US.

Earlier this year I speculated on the possibility of Forest, as last year's Best Actor winner, reading Marion's name from the envelope and handing her the Oscar...sigh.

Along with Cate Blanchett, Keira Knightley, Ryan Gosling, Julia Stiles and now Forest, it's pretty cool to see that actors, Marion's peers (and, as it happens, the largest voting branch of the Academy) are coming out in her support.

In any case, nice to see Forest supporting his girl.

Source

Serendipity

I had a thought recently--how appropriate would it be for Marion to win an Academy Award next year. It is an Oscar ceremony tradition that the Best Actor winner from the previous year present the Best Actress award during the ceremony. Should Marion win, which, let's face it, is pretty much all sewn up lest she kill a puppy, her Oscar would be presented by Forest Whitaker. Why is this meaningful, you ask? Well, Forest and Marion co-starred in Abel Ferrara's Mary a couple of years ago.

How cool would that be?