Jon McLaughlin sings ‘So Close’ at the 2008 Oscars.
Oscar 2008 ceremony images: Jon McLaughlin sings ‘So Close’
At the 2008 Academy Awards ceremony, singer Jon McLaughlin performed “So Close,” the Academy Award-nominated song from Kevin Lima’s box office hit Enchanted, starring Amy Adams, Patrick Dempsey, and Oscar winner Susan Sarandon (Dead Man Walking, 1995).
Curiously, Enchanted was shortlisted for three Oscars, all in the same category: Best Original Song. Besides “So Close,” the other nominees were “Happy Working Song” (performed at the Oscars by Amy Adams) and “That’s How You Know” (performed by Kristin Chenoweth).
All three songs have music by Alan Menken and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz. (See “unedited” Jon McLaughlin “So Close” photo below.)
Just as curiously – though not unexpectedly – the three Enchanted songs lost the Best Song Oscar to Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová’s “Falling Slowly” from the well-received romantic drama Once.
Of note, Jon McLaughlin hasn’t had a movie career so far. As a ballroom singer, he sings “So Close” in Enchanted – and that’s pretty much it.
Jon McLaughlin image: Darren Decker | © A.M.P.A.S.
Kristin Chenoweth performs ‘That’s How You Know’ from Kevin Lima’s ‘Enchanted.’
Kristin Chenoweth image: Michael Yada | © A.M.P.A.S.
Amy Adams on the Oscar 2008 Red Carpet.
Amy Adams
Enchanted actress Amy Adams – donning a Veronica Lake-style hairdo – brings a bit of old-style Hollywood glamour to the 2008 Academy Awards’ red carpet. Two years prior to that, Adams was a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nominee for Junebug (2005). She lost to Rachel Weisz in Fernando Meirelles’ The Constant Gardener.
Amy Adams image: Matt Petit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Helen Mirren and Daniel Day-Lewis: British etiquette (or whatever) at the Oscar ceremony.
Helen Mirren & Daniel Day-Lewis
In the image above, Daniel Day-Lewis bows to Queen Helen Mirren at the 2008 Academy Awards ceremony held on Feb. 24 at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood. Whether you find that cute or phony, is your call.
Day-Lewis won his second Best Actor Oscar for his work in Paul Thomas Anderson’s There Will Be Blood – nearly two decades after his first win, for Jim Sheridan’s My Left Foot at the 1990 ceremony.
Helen Mirren won last year’s Best Actress Oscar for Stephen Frears’ The Queen, in which she plays English monarch Elizabeth II.
Daniel Day-Lewis and Helen Mirren have never made a movie together.
See below more images from the 2008 Oscar ceremony.
Robert Elswit: Best Cinematography Oscar winner for There Will Be Blood.
Rebecca Miller, Daniel Day-Lewis
Photo: Richard Harbaugh | © A.M.P.A.S.
The Oscar 2008 ceremony was directed by Louis J. Ovitz and Joseph Takats.
Helen Mirren and Daniel Day-Lewis image: Michael Yada | © A.M.P.A.S.
Robert Elswit image: Matt Petit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (A.M.P.A.S.) website.
Alex Gibney.
Photos: Michael Yada (Garner). All images: © A.M.P.A.S.
All other images: Greg Harbaugh | © A.M.P.A.S.
George Clooney: Best Actor Oscar nominee for ‘Michael Clayton.’
Photo: George Clooney: Michael Yada | © A.M.P.A.S.
Christopher Rouse.
Christopher Rouse
Film and television editor Christopher Rouse won the Best Film Editing Oscar for The Bourne Ultimatum. Last year, he was nominated for Paul Greengrass’ United 93 (2006).
Rouse’s father was screenwriter-director-producer Russell Rouse, whose credits include the Western The Fastest Gun Alive (1956), starring Glenn Ford and Jeanne Crain; and Michael Gordon’s Doris Day-Rock Hudson hit comedy Pillow Talk (1959), which earned him (alongside Clarence Greene, Stanley Shapiro, and Maurice Richlin) that year’s Best Original Screenplay Oscar.
Christopher Rouse’s mother was actress Beverly Michaels, who died in June last year. Michaels’ few feature film credits include the B movies Wicked Woman (1953), directed by her future husband.
Christopher Rouse image: Matt Pettit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Philippe Pollet-Villard, Best Live Action Short Film Academy Award winner for The Mozart of Pickpockets
Philippe Pollet-Villard, Francesca Lo Schiavo and Dante Ferretti images: Matt Petit | © A.M.P.A.S.
2008 Oscar photos
Below are Oscar 2008 pictures of composer Dario Marianelli and others.
Dario Marianelli: Best Original Score Oscar winner for Joe Wright’s ‘Atonement.’
Helen Mirren and Best Supporting Actor Oscar winner Javier Bardem.
Javier Bardem
Javier Bardem was the year’s Best Supporting Actor Academy Award winner for his performance as a merciless hired killer in Joel and Ethan Coen’s thriller No Country for Old Men. Bardem had been previously been nominated in the Best Actor category for Julian Schnabel’s Before Night Falls (2000), in which he plays Cuban poet Reinaldo Arenas.
Javier Bardem Oscar image: Matt Petit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Helen Mirren & Javier Bardem image: Darren Decker | © A.M.P.A.S.
Amy Ryan
Amy Ryan image: Michael Yada | © A.M.P.A.S.
Tilda Swinton.
Tilda Swinton
Tilda Swinton, whose film credits in the last two decades or so range from the outlandishly independent to the mind-numbingly commercial, was the Best Supporting Actress Academy Award winner at the 2008 Oscar ceremony held on Feb. 24 at the Kodak Theatre in the Los Angeles district of Hollywood. Swinton won for her performance in Tony Gilroy’s Michael Clayton, a socially conscious drama costarring George Clooney and Tom Wilkinson. That was Swinton’s first Oscar nomination.
Tilda Swinton Oscar 2008 image: Matt Petit | © A.M.P.A.S.
More Oscar 2008 photos
Below are a few more Oscar 2008 images.
Harrison Ford and Calista Flockhart.
Harrison Ford & Calista Flockhart
Best Actor Oscar nominee Harrison Ford (Witness, 1985) and Calista Flockhart arrive at the 2008 Academy Awards ceremony. Among the Best Picture Oscar nominees featuring Ford are George Lucas’ Star Wars (1977), Steven Spielberg’s Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Peter Weir’s Witness, Mike Nichols’ Working Girl (1988), and Andrew Davies’ The Fugitive (1993).
Calista Flockhart is best known for the television series Ally McBeal, though she has been featured in a handful of movies, including Mike Nichols’ The Birdcage and A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Harrison Ford and Calista Flockhart image: Richard Harbaugh | © A.M.P.A.S.
Joel and Ethan Coen, presenter Martin Scorsese: Double Oscar winners for ‘No Country for Old Men.’
Martin Scorsese was last year’s Best Director winner for the gangster drama The Departed, which also took home the Best Picture Oscar. In the cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Jack Nicholson, Vera Farmiga, Mark Wahlberg, and Martin Sheen.
Glen Hansard, Markéta Irglová – best original song winners, Once
Photo: Matt Petit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Photos: Matt Petit (Asano), Michael Yada (Ryan). All images: © A.M.P.A.S.
Katherine Heigl
Photo: Matt Petit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Dario Marianelli images: Matt Petit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Daniel Day-Lewis image: Matt Petit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Joel and Ethan Coen, Martin Scorsese, Daniel Day-Lewis images: Matt Pettit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (A.M.P.A.S.) website.
Diane Lane, Josh Brolin
Photos: Richard Harbaugh. All images: © A.M.P.A.S.
Photos: Richard Harbaugh (Ronan), Darren Decker (Linney). All images: © A.M.P.A.S.
Photos: Greg Harbaugh (Brolin). All images: © A.M.P.A.S.
John Travolta, Kelly Preston
Photos: Greg Harbaugh (Dee), Darren Decker (Travolta). All images: © A.M.P.A.S.
Nicole Kidman
Nicole Kidman has been nominated for two Best Actress Academy Awards: Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge! (2001), with Ewan McGregor, and Stephen Daldry’s The Hours (2002), with Meryl Streep and Julianne Moore. Kidman won for the latter film.
Photo: Greg Harbaugh | © A.M.P.A.S.
Miley Cyrus on the Oscars’ Red Carpet
Television actress Miley Cyrus isn’t a movie star – her only film appearance to date has been a bit part while still a little child in Tim Burton’s Big Fish. Even so, TV’s Hannah Montana was one of those attending the 2008 Academy Awards ceremony, where she got to chat with Turner Classic Movies and Oscar Red Carpet host Robert Osborne. Miley Cyrus’ second big-screen foray will be in the upcoming animated feature Bolt, which features her voice, in addition to those of John Travolta, Malcolm McDowell, and Chloë Grace Moretz. See below the “uncut” image of Miley Cyrus on the Oscar Red Carpet.
Oscar nominees Michael Moore, Ronald Harwood
Besides TV star Miley Cyrus, others attending the 2008 Academy Awards were nominees Michael Moore and Ronald Harwood (both seen below, chatting with Robert Osborne). Michael Moore, an Oscar winner for the documentary feature Bowling for Columbine, was back for another documentary feature, Sicko, an indictment of the United States’ healthcare(less) system. Ronald Harwood, an Oscar winner in the Best Adapted Screenplay category for the Roman Polanski-directed Holocaust drama The Pianist, was nominated this year in the same category for the Julian Schnabel-directed drama The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, starring Mathieu Amalric as a tetraplegic-turned-author.
Ronald Harwood had been previously nominated for his adaptation of the stage play The Dresser, which became a 1983 movie directed by Peter Yates, and starring Albert Finney and Tom Courtenay.
Below are Oscar Red Carpet host Robert Osborne; Oscar nominees Michael Moore and Ronald Harwood; Oscar winners Philippe Pollet-Villard, Dante Ferretti, and Francesca Lo Schiavo; and Miley Cyrus.
Julie Christie, Robert Osborne.
Photos: Matt Petit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Saoirse Ronan, Robert Osborne
Photo: Richard Harbaugh (Ronan).
Photos of Michael Moore, Ronald Harwood, and Miley Cyrus: Matt Petit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Anne-Marie Duff, James McAvoy
Photos: Matt Petit (Alba), Michael Yada (McAvoy & Duff). All images: © A.M.P.A.S.
Photos: Richard Harbaugh (Gilroy, Dee), Greg Harbaugh (Mortensen). All images: © A.M.P.A.S.
Viggo Mortensen
Photos: Matt Petit (Mortensen). All images: © A.M.P.A.S.
Marion Cotillard: Best Actress Oscar winner for ‘La Vie en Rose.’
Among Marion Cotillard’s Best Actress competitors were Julie Christie (Away from Her) and Ellen Page (Juno).
Daniel Day-Lewis, an embarrassed Tilda Swinton, Marion Cotillard and Javier Bardem: Odd Oscar kissing quartet.
Marion Cotillard & Oscar quartet images: Matt Pettit | © A.M.P.A.S.
Oscar performers & presenters
Oscar 2008 telecast producer Gilbert Cates and Academy of Motion Picture Arts and SciencesPresident Sid Ganis have announced the names of presenters and performers who will take part in the February 24 Oscar show at the Kodak Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center.
To date, the presenters are last year’s four acting winners, Alan Arkin, Jennifer Hudson, Helen Mirren (right, at the 2007 Oscar ceremony), and Forest Whitaker, as well as Amy Adams, Jessica Alba, Cate Blanchett, Josh Brolin, Steve Carell, George Clooney, Penélope Cruz, Miley Cyrus, Patrick Dempsey, Cameron Diaz, Colin Farrell, Harrison Ford, and Jennifer Garner.
Also, Tom Hanks, Anne Hathaway, Katherine Heigl, Jonah Hill, Dwayne Johnson, Nicole Kidman, James McAvoy, Queen Latifah, Seth Rogen, Martin Scorsese, Hilary Swank, John Travolta, Denzel Washington, and Renée Zellweger.
Best Foreign Language Film Symposium
The 2010 Academy Awards’ Foreign Language Film Symposium was held yesterday, Feb. 23, at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills.
All five directors of this year’s nominated films were present: Joseph Cedar (Beaufort, Israel); Nikita Mikhalkov (12, Russia); Andrzej Wajda (Katyn, Poland); Sergei Bodrov (Mongol, Kazakhstan); and Stefan Ruzowitzky (The Counterfeiters, Austria).
Academy president Bruce Davis introduced the symposium, which was moderated by the Academy’s Chair of the Foreign Language Film Committee Mark Johnson.
Photos: Todd Wawrychuk / Darren Decker (directors’ solo photos) | © A.M.P.A.S.
Andrzej Wajda
Nikita Mikhalkov
Joseph Cedar
Photos: Todd Wawrychuk | © A.M.P.A.S.
Crane-Lifting Huge Oscar Statue
Yesterday, the first giant Oscar statue for the 2008 Oscar ceremony was crane-lifted into place at the entrance of the Kodak Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard as preparations began for the 80th Academy Awards.
The 2008 Academy Awards ceremony will take place on Sunday, February 24 at the Kodak Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center. In the US, it will be televised live by ABC beginning at 5 p.m. PT.
(The stars on Hollywood Boulevard sidewalk next to the Oscar statue are those of Charlize Theron, Halle Berry, Steven Spielberg, Mike Medavoy, Martin Scorsese, and Jamie Foxx.)
Photos: Todd Wawrychuk | © A.M.P.A.S.