Academy Awards

Tongues are wagging about Eddie Murphy ditching the Academy Awards just after losing out on the Best Supporting Actor Award to Alan Arkin. But Eddie insists that he wasn’t being a sore loser (just a regular loser, I guess).

Eddie’s rep says:

“Eddie had always planned on leaving after his category was announced to spend the rest of the evening with his family,” says rep Arnold Robinson, adding, “He did the same thing following the Golden Globe Awards.” (Murphy did win at the Globes.)

I’m not surprised that Eddie snuck out early. He had to go find the guy who decided to release Norbit while Academy members were still voting and beat him senseless. I’m sure while Jennifer Hudson was giving her moving acceptance speech, Eddie was in a production office somewhere trying to suffocate the Norbit publicity guy with a fat suit and yelling “you couldn’t have waited until after they voted for me??”

Maybe Eddie can sculpt a little Oscar look-a-like out of gold plated dollar bills after his big, fat (yes, pun intended) Norbit payday.

Katie Holmes is doing her best to follow in Nicole Kidman’s Jimmy Choo footsteps. The new Mrs. Tom Cruise was spotted at the Academy Awards doing a freakishly good Stepford Wives imitation. Of course she doesn’t seem to realize that The Stepford Wives was a movie and that Nicole was just pretending to be a brainwashed, puppy wife.

From US Magazine:

Cruise, 44, greeted a few photographers but didn’t introduce his wife, who said nothing and stood next to her husband, waiting for him to finish his conversations. He later asked her again to pose for a picture alone, and she finally agreed.

“She looks at him for direction,” the witness tells Us.

Well, I’m glad there’s nothing dysfunctional about this marriage. I’d love to get a peek at the pre-nup. I want to know exactly how much longer Katie has to give up her dignity, her mind and her self-esteem before she can split with the cash and the career boost.

Did anyone else find it a little odd that Brad Pitt skipped the Academy Awards this year? I ask not just because I missed seeing the super hot Brad all dolled up, but because it seems odd that he would snub the ceremony. His film Babel had a bunch of nominations, including one for co-star Cate Blanchett, and Brad was a producer on The Departed which won for Best Picture.

Brad’s rep claims that Brad was too busy working to attend. Sure, that must be it. Or could it be that Brad, who is supposedly above everything Hollywood now that he has Angelina and the kids, is feeling a bit neglected by Oscar? After all, George Clooney and Matt Damon both have the little blad guys sitting on their shelves. That must make bar-b-ques a little awkward. I predict we’ll be seeing Brad play a quadrapeligic teacher who teaches a mute boy to sing in his next movie…that should get him a nomination.

Oh, and how cute are these kids? If this family gets any prettier I may throw up.

So the votes have been counted, the little gold bald guys have gone home with the winners and the last of the drunk celebrities have been swept off the floor. Now comes the stuff we really care about…who looked good on the red carpet and who looked like they need to fire their stylist.

This year the fashions at the Academy Awards were all about being bold and taking risks. Some of it worked and some of it flopped. Here is my totally uninformed, uneducated, based soley on what made me go “wow” or “yech” Oscar fashion recap.

Fashion winners:

Helen Mirren not only won Best Actress, but she has to be up for Best Dressed as well. She looked gorgeous in a Christian Lacroix gown. Cate Blanchett was oh so sexy in a Swarovski crystal studded Armani dress that clung to her body like Brad Pitt when she got shot in Babel.

Penelope Cruz is sitting on my fashion fence. I loved the top of her Versace gown, but the bottom is questionable. Somehow it mostly works for her, but I’m advising her to avoid feathers in the future.

Nicole Kidman was stunning, as always, in a bright red Balenciaga halter gown with a big ol’ bow one one shoulder. I wasn’t sold on the bow, but then I saw her face and remembered why she can do no wrong. Gorgeous! Hopefully Tom Cruise was kicking himself just a little bit when she hit the stage.

Kate Winslet was channeling her inner Greek godess in a one shoulder Valentino. She may not have had a snowball’s chance in hell at winning this year, but girlfriend looked fabulous. The hair, make-up, jewlery…just perfect.

So those are my picks for style winners. These were the women who made me say, “wow, she’s so beautiful. Bitch.” Now go visit my post on the fashion losers. You know that’s what you really want to read.

Now for the fun part, who should have skipped the red carpet. I don’t mind being bitchy about this because these women have buckets of cash and professional people to style, primp and pamper them before the show. It’s not my fault if they hired a fashion school drop-out or if they forgot to look in a mirror before popping open the champagne in their limo.

So here are my picks for the big fashion losers:

Jennifer Hudson may have won the Oscar, but that is no excuse for the Judy Jetson gold python jacket she was sporting on the red carpet. At least she had the sense to take it off later so she won’t have to look back on her big moment in that bolero…yuck!

Anne Hathaway in Valentino. What is with the ink spot on the front? Not only was it unflattering to her figure, it looked like a giant butterfly crashed into the front of her gown.

Jessica Biel wore an pink Oscar de la Renta halter that looked hot, but she gets marked down for her hair, too bumpy, and for her obiovus lack of a bra. It would look hot on her if it hadn’t been so cold in LA last night.

Gwyneth Paltrow. I may be the lone nay-sayer on this one, but I didn’t like the meshy, peach Spiderman dress. The criss-crossing lines were distracting and made me a little dizzy. Plus her lipstick is way too red for the gown. She needs to go kiss a few guys to tone down the bright red color.

Cameron Diaz showed up sporting an angular white off the shoulder something that looked like it came right out of a paper factory. It was one of my least favorite looks of the night. Right up there with a bald Jack Nicholson sitting the front row. Check the tape…he’s as bald as Britney.

So, that’s my take on Oscar fashion. Of course I spent the night in yoga pants and a tank top eating ice cream while watching E!. So what do I know?

And the winners are…no big surprise. Unless you made a philosophical decision to shun all things electronic yesterday, you probably know the Hollywood love fest otherwise known as the 79th Annual Academy Awards were last night. The orgy of celebrites celebrating themselves was fairly predictable.

The four acting awards went just as everyone predicted with the one exception of Alan Arkin taking the Best Supporting Actor Award and leaving Eddie Murphy looking like he had just been sucker punched (which he kinda was). Jennifer Hudson took home the bald guy for Dreamgirls…duh. And Helen Mirren and Forrest Whitaker finished up their clean sweep of the movie awards season for their royal roles in The Queen and The Last King of Scotland.

There were a few memorable moments in the mostly boring broadcast. Ellen DeGeneres was entertaining in her first date with Oscar and Martin Scorsese finally won for Best Director after being The Academy’s favorite bridesmaid for so many years.

And in one funny moment, former VP Al Gore, who made an appearnace with Leonardo DiCaprio to ask everyone to turn off their lights and drive hybrid cars, was cut off by music just as he “decided” to announce his run for president in ‘08…a joke that was a little too well received by the house full of liberals with checkbooks.