Best actress: Why doesn't Hollywood care?

Remember late last year when everyone was wringing their hands over the dearth of best actress candidates? Seems ages ago. In fact, if there’s any category that points up the absurdity of artists competing with one another it’s this one. How do you compare Annette Bening’s vulnerable diva with Imelda Staunton’s sweet-spirited abortionist with Hilary Swank’s gritty boxer with Catalina Sandino Moreno’s brave drug courier with Kate Winslet’s kooky, punkish object of our affection? You resort to cliché. Truly all five are winners.

By which I don’t mean the actresses so much as the five moviegoers who managed to see all their performances. Yes, “Eternal Sunshine” did okay business last spring, and Oscar nominations will help “Million Dollar Baby” get out there, but you’d be hard-pressed to find three outstanding movies more marginalized than “Being Julia,” “Maria Full of Grace” and “Vera Drake.” Hell, they don’t even make it to marginalized status, since none managed a marginal release (“Julia's” 233 theaters was tops). None made even $10 million at the box office — the “Titanic” of the three, “Maria,” earned a whopping $6.5 million. Did you blink last fall? That’s your problem. That’s why you missed them.

Swank vs. Bening
No weak links among the nominees but also no surprises. In its January 14 issue, “Entertainment Weekly” correctly predicted every best actress nominee, and for most handicappers it’s already down to a two-woman race: between Golden Globe winner (for comedy) Annette Bening and Golden Globe winner (for drama) Hilary Swank. Since the Academy generally chooses drama over comedy, most are already handing the statuette to Swank and cueing shots of husband Chad Lowe crying in the audience.

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According to these folks, it’s 1999 redux, when Swank and “Boys Don’t Cry” beat out Bening and “American Beauty” for the statuette. This sense of déjà vu is actually the one thing in Bening’s favor. Swank has the dramatic and more-honored picture, not to mention the youth (no actress over 40 years old has won best actress since 1995); but the Academy also likes to spread the wealth around. Hilary Swank is a fine actress, but if she wins she’ll have more best actress statuettes on her mantle than Meryl Streep. Meanwhile, Bening’s mantle is filled with just Warren’s crap. Perhaps enough Academy people think she deserves some crap of her own.

Besides, to be honest, the “more-honored film” doesn’t mean much in this category. In the last five years, the best actress appeared in a best picture nominee only twice (Kidman’s “The Hours” and Roberts’ “Erin Brockovich”), while four of the five best actors came from best picture nominees (Spacey’s “American Beauty”; Crowe’s “Gladiator”; Brody’s “The Pianist” and Penn’s “Mystic River”). This year’s no different. Four of the five best actor nominees are from best picture nominees. Only one best actress nominee (Swank) is from a best picture nominee.

Women? Your stories don’t matter
All of this continues a trend in effect since World War II. In the first 15 years of the Academy (roughly 1928-43), the woman who won best actress appeared in that year’s best picture three times: Luise Rainier for “The Great Ziegfield” in 1936, Vivien Leigh for “Gone with the Wind” in 1939, and Greer Garson for “Mrs. Miniver” in 1942. The number of best actors who appeared in best pictures during this period? None. (Throughout this discussion we’ll ignore the three years in which both best actor and best actress appeared in the best picture: 1934, 1975, and 1991.)

Did women’s stories suddenly seem silly and unimportant after D-Day and the Battle of the Bulge? Perhaps. Because the next time a best actress appeared in a best picture wasn’t until 1977: Diane Keaton for “Annie Hall.” During that same period, 15 best actors starred in best pictures, and to this day, best pictures tend to be testosterone-filled enterprises: “Braveheart” and “Gladiator” and the like. It’s the Academy’s way of telling women their stories don’t matter.

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