Unofficial Academy Awards Discussion Board

Greg wrote:

gunnar wrote:Houseman was excellent and did a great job reprising the role in the tv show on CBS and Showtime.

Did you vote for him? He doesn't have a vote listed.

No, I'd already voted earlier for De Niro. I should have mentioned it, though. I was responding to CatWilliam's comment about Houseman. I watched the Paper Chase tv show regularly when it aired on Showtime and bought the dvds when they came out. I didn't see the movie until much later.

gunnar wrote:Houseman was excellent and did a great job reprising the role in the tv show on CBS and Showtime.

Did you vote for him? He doesn't have a vote listed.

Voted for Joel Grey.

But this was a fantastic decade. Many memorable winners.

The rest in descending order:

Ben Johnson, John Houseman, Jack Albertson, Gig Young, De Niro, Robards (All the President's Men), Mills, Robards (Julia) and George Burns.

Houseman was excellent and did a great job reprising the role in the tv show on CBS and Showtime.

Jack Albertson was indeed wonderful but he's not a supporting actor in The Subject Was Roses.

John Mills is obviously very noticeable in Ryan's Daughter, but Trevor Howard was better in the same film.

Ben Johnson has nine minutes of screentime in The Last Picture Show and the viewer still can form a very reliable picture of a whole lifetime. The movie, of course, helps.

John Houseman is very intriguing as the Professor. The kind of performance that nowadays would never win.

George Burns is the weakest winner amongst this group, and also a co-lead.

Joel Grey and Robert De Niro make an everlasting, unforgettable impression in both their masterpieces, but Grey played more of an icon than a character and De Niro played a character we had already seen before, as fresh as he made it. Gig Young would be my runner-up, because I really think Jason Robards' two consecutive wins are among the most distinguished this category has ever seen. His Ben Bradlee and Dashiell Hammett are the epitome of what a supporting actor should do with very limited screen time. He's quiet but intense, restrained but empathic without obviously showing it. And his eyes communicate a true life lived apart from the limits of the shot. He always fascinates me. I voted for his Julia performance, which was slightly more impressive.

Like my pick for best supporting actress of the decade, my pick for best supporting actor is one who though repeating a role he perfected on stage is so inventive and fresh in the role on screen that he still manages to surprise me every time I see it. That is Jack Albertson in The Subject Was Roses.

Joel Grey, who also manages to bring freshness to a well-worn stage role in Cabaret, is my first runner-up.

Veteran Ben Johnson in the role of his career in Cabaret is my second runner-up.

Gig Young in a fierce performance in They Shoot Horses, Don't They? is my third runner-up.

John Houseman's towering performance in The Paper Chase is my fourth runner-up.

Of his two winning performances, I preferred Jason Robards in All the President's Men

John Mills' performance in Ryan's Daughter was secondary to Trevor Howard's supporting work in teh same film.

Robert De Niro was fine in The Godfather: Part II but the film's strongest scenes were those with Pacino, Cazale, et. al. not teh flashback scenes in which he appeared.

George Burns was playing George Burns in The Sunshine Boys which isn't a bad thing, but it wasn't an Oscar caliber performance.

De Niro

My thought are coming up. What are yours?