VERY BAD THINGS
--Media Circus--
It's funny how the Razzies have become such an entrenched part of the Oscars season media landscape. Two dozen years ago, I was helping founder John JB Wilson - we'd both recently graduated from UCLA - carry cardboard boxes from a dumpster to his apartment, where a little poster paint and glue transformed them into props for the very first Golden Raspberry Awards. Now every year JB, as he's known to friends, fields calls from dozens of media outlets across the world in the weeks leading up to the Razzie Awards, which have progressed beyond their hey-kids-let's-put-on-a-show origins. Winners for the worst achievement in film are announced the day before the Oscars - this year's ceremony/press conference takes place at the Four Points Sheraton in Santa Monica on Saturday, February 28 - and the media have developed a habit of using the Razzies to needle nominated celebrities.
The front runners this year are the Ben Affleck/Jennifer Lopez bomb Gigli and the American Idol synergy disappointment From Justin to Kelly. Or, as the Razzies website (Razzies.com) put it a few weeks ago: "Will it really be Gigli or is Kelly more smelly?" So, sure enough, during an American Idol online chat hosted by the Washington Post, someone asked Idol judge Randy Jackson if there were plans to congratulate first-season stars Justin and Kelly on-air for their Razzies nominations during Idol's current third season. (Jackson's tactful response: "Kelly is still a great talent and she will go on.")
Meanwhile, in an interview to promote the opening of Paycheck in Europe last month, French journalist Didier Verdurand asked Ben Affleck if he planned to attend the Razzies, since Gigli looks like it might collect many Framboises d'Or for Affleck's trophy shelf. (At least in theory: Actual gold-painted plaster Raspberry Awards are in short supply, so Wilson usually sends out certificates instead. And he still likes saving money on props. When John Travolta's Scientology sci-fi stinker Battlefield Earth won Worst Picture in 2001 - the Razzies name for it was Plan 9 From L. Ron Hubbard - JB snapped up a Battlefield Earth doll he found priced at $2.98 in a Toys R Us bargain bin.)
"I assume we're heavy favorites to win," Affleck answered about his Gigli chances, adding that he might indeed show up. Wilson has been pressing Affleck's publicist, Ken Sunshine, about this, but so far no response.
"Something about my claiming to have read a French magazine seemed to put him off," said JB. "[Sunshine] said, 'This sounds like a crank call.'"
A few years ago, people in Hollywood began using these anti-Oscars to make a point, which is always: "It wasn't my fault." Screenwriter Joe Eszterhas is known for fuming at philistines who meddle with his genius, as readers of his new memoir Hollywood Animal and recent Los Angeles Times op-ed complaining about Michael Eisner know. So after Eszterhas's An Alan Smithee Film: Burn Hollywood Burn bombed in time for the 1999 Razzies, the screenwriter took out a full-page ad in Variety, announcing that he was accepting his probable Razzie award in advance "and will appear in person" to receive it.
Alas, Eszterhas wasn't as good as his word, even though his other film, Showgirls, had broken a Razzies record two years earlier by winning seven awards. "I left a message on his home phone reminding him of his promise and asking when he wanted to pick up his Razzies, but he never called back," Wilson says. "We did hold up a copy of the Variety ad repeatedly during the ceremony."
JB nevertheless considered asking Eszterhas to write the intro to his new book project The Official Razzie Movie Guide, out next year in time for the 2005 Oscars and the Razzies' quarter-century anniversary. But he went with Rolling Stone movie critic Peter Travers instead. This struck me as an odd choice for a book about bad movies, as Travers is notorious for liking everything. The two bonded over their shared fondness for the Kim Novak lesbian cult film The Legend of Lylah Clare, though, which JB described as "a cross between Vertigo and Sunset Boulevard, except not good."
Even when they don't show up at the ceremony, Hollywood types use the Razzies as a medium to convey their message. When screenwriter Steven E. de Souza won a Razzie for Hudson Hawk, de Souza's assistant called up to claim the award later. He explained that his boss wanted to present it to the film's meddlesome producer-star, Bruce Willis, who de Souza felt really deserved worst screenplay credit.
Wilson, who makes his living writing Hollywood advertising copy, alternates between snippy impatience and cackles of glee when discussing bad movies. Because the Razzies website lists the entire archive of Razzies honorees, some winners call years later to claim their awards. Frank Stallone called a few years ago to claim the Worst Song Razzie he'd won long before for Rambo II, and Wilson hoped he'd show up to accept brother Sylvester's Worst Actor of the Century award for the 20th anniversary gala in 2000, but no luck.
"He said he was busy, but my guess is their mom said he shouldn't do it," JB said.
Other nominees are more enthusiastic. "Tom Green came the year he was nominated," JB recalled, "and, in fact, insisted he did Freddy Got Fingered just to get a Razzie in 2002. He was OK on stage - no dead animals, no cripples were harmed - but then he started a harmonica solo and wouldn't leave. So finally we carried him off like they did with Lou Grant in that last scene from The Mary Tyler Moore Show."
One of Wilson's favorite media moments, in fact, is thanks to Tom Green. Katie Couric asked in a Today show interview who he wanted to see as that year's big winner. "I said it would have to be the one with the soon-to-be-ex-Mr. Drew Barrymore," JB recalled. "And Katie said, 'You're so mean!'"
Meanwhile, the Razzies have become such an institution that people sometimes try to claim one even when they aren't technically qualified. "A few years ago we got a call from Carrot Top's agent," JB said about the Chairman of the Board star. "I said he's very welcome to attend, but the film was not nominated. And the agent said, 'Why not? His movie sucked!'"
Published: 02/26/2004
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