Ellen Burstyn's 14-second Emmy-nominated performance! — Page 2

"Supporting" or "featured" tacked onto any recognition award will cause controversy, since these are not very clearly defined parameters.

You have Straight winning and Oscar for a 5-minute performance, and three years earlier Tatum O'Neal wins in the same category and almost never left the screen for the entire movie. Was she "supporting" simply because she was 10 years old? A half-sized award for a half-sized leading performance?

I think the Academy (faults and all) comes closer to getting it right than the Emmys or Tonys do, however. For the Acting nomination process, the Acting members get a plain piece of paper with five completely blank lines on it for each of the four acting categories. They can write in anyone's name they want to that is eligible as an actor in a film. There are no rules for who is leading or who is supporting. The publicity machines try to steer voters into preconceived categories by their "For Your Consideration" ad blitzes during awards season, but these are only "friendly" suggestions as to who to nominate and in which category a voter should consider them. It helps those “sad cases” when a performance is on the fence between "supporting" and "leading" in the voters' general perception, and this can actually hurt an actor's chance of getting EITHER nomination, if they fall between the cracks. So the ads and publicity help to "focus" voters in a unified direction... but voters are not obligated to follow the suggestions. It's a blank line. And they get to decide who they want to write down on it.

EDIT: By the way, if an acting performance generates enough votes in both the leading and supporting categories, the category in which they received the MOST nominations will be recognized with the nomination. They won't get BOTH nominations, even if their vote tallies are high enough. That happened only once in Oscar history (for Barry Fitzgerald in "Going My Way," who received both leading AND supporing actor nominations for the same performance)... and after that they made the rule that would prevent it from ever happening again.

Another interesting rule... an Oscar nominee has to be at least ONE voting member's #1 choice to get on the ballot. It has happened in the past were someone was "everybody's 2nd or 3rd choice" and received enough votes to be in the top five, BUT failed to be anyone's #1 pick. That would rule them out of eligibility for a nomination. In truth, only the "number one" picks are actually counted (even though voters do have an opportunity to list FIVE nomination choices in order of preference). But their numbers 2-5 are only used to break ties, if they are needed.

(I know... long-winded again.)

Since I've had a few friends in the Academy over the years, I've always been fascinated by these "little rules" that make up the process of voting.

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Updated On: 8/9/06 at 05:10 PM

And if you want to watch her entire performance, you can check it out here:

http://highdefdvd.typepad.com/jed/2006/08/ellen_burstyns_.html

This is ****ing crazy.

Cruel_Sandwich---Wow. That's hilarious... and tragic.

That Emmy committee should be ashamed of themselves. There's no possible argument as to why they voted for her.

Someone ought to publish a list of their names. Expose them for the shysters they really are.

Ellen must be completely embarrassed by this unwanted publicity. I'll bet she doesn't show up to the ceremony.

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blueroses: you're going to kick me in the nuts.

the winner was julia f***ing roberts! ugh...