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| MIRAMAX FILMS/AP |
| Actress Catherine Zeta-Jones is shown in a scene from the Oscar-nominated "Chicago." |
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Oscar picks a tall order
RITA ZEKAS
Assuming tomorrow's event is still on, the Academy Awards marks its 75th anniversary this year. Over the years, as newspapers, radio and newsreels took an increasing interest in the awards, Oscar winners have wallowed in the limelight, sucking the life out of every minute of their speeches, which have ballooned in length and hyperbole. As early as the March 4, 1937, ceremony, toastmaster George Jessel encouraged them to keep it short and sweet. "Two or three minutes is enough for anything. Remember, a fellow gave up the British Empire in two minutes," he said, referring to the recent abdication of King Edward VIII.Keep it short doesn't work for Oscar speeches — or Oscar nominees as a rule. Everybody rambles on, especially if they are recipients of lifetime achievement awards. They seem to think they can take a lifetime on the podium.And you can't get Julia Roberts to shut up. It's one thing to rattle on when you've won the best actress Oscar yourself; it's another thing to be a presenter and upstage your good pal, Denzel Washington, when he tries to pick up his hardware.Roberts is 5 foot 9; Washington stands 6 feet. This year's Oscar nominees tend not to be pipsqueaks either. If white guys can't jump, short guys can't win. You notice Andy Serkis, the guy who played ground hugger Gollum in Lord Of The Rings: Two Towers, didn't get a nomination.Best actor nominees Adrien Brody and Nicolas Cage are both 6 foot 1 inch; Michael Caine is 6 foot 2 inches; Daniel Day Lewis is 6 foot 1 1/2; and Jack Nicholson is 5 foot 9, although he's been listed as 5 foot 11in IMDB (International Movie Data Base).We stalked Nicholson during a party in Soho in New York during the Witches Of Eastwick era and there's no way he was 5 foot 11. He was wearing baggy, old brown corduroy pants with the butt worn out and sucking on a stinky cigar, when we cornered him. He had to look up at us to deflect our headlock and we're only 5 foot 9 1/2.Rule of thumb, or Tom Thumb as it were: actors are always shorter in person and actresses are skinnier. Just like models, actresses tend to have oversized heads and stick bodies. Lollipop women, as it were. Think Jackie Kennedy.Canadian actors tend to run small: Sarah Polley, Molly Parker, Michelle Nolden, Tamara Hickey and Kari Matchett have no hips.Tom Cruise, who is 5 foot 7 inches, has never won an Oscar.The ex. Mrs. Cruise, Nicole Kidman, who is now able to wear stilettos to the ceremony, towers over him at 5 foot 10.Kidman's fellow best actress nominees Julianne Moore and Renée Zellwegger (who is a munchkin) are both 5 foot 5. Diane Lane is 5 foot 6 and Salma Hayek is only 5 foot 2 but makes up for it in machismo.Queen Latifah could take Catherine Zeta-Jones in the supporting actress height competition: Latifah is 5 foot 10 to Zeta-Jones' 5 foot 8.At 5 foot 6 inches, Meryl Streep has three inches on Kathy Bates. Male actors seem to fudge their height — an inch matters vertically too — just as the women are not exactly forthcoming about their age or weight.Ask Mama Morton/Latifah what she weighs at your own risk.During an interview with Ben Affleck for The Sum Of All Fears, we remarked that we were obviously in the tall-guy suite, since Affleck was 6 foot 2 (according to the Internet) and we'd interviewed 6 foot 5 inch Vince Vaughn there previously."I'm 6 foot 3 1/2," Affleck claimed. Since we had no tape measure on hand, we didn't dispute it, although the photographer didn't have to stand on a chair to shoot Affleck, as he did Vaughn.Mel Gibson, Oscar winner for Braveheart in 1995, is listed as 5 foot 11 on IMDB. Other Internet sources cite him as 5 foot 8 and 5 foot 9.We believe the 5 foot 8 entry. Way back in 1983 when Gibson was in Toronto shooting Mrs. Soffel, we were hanging out in a dark downtown alleyway in the whee! hours, waiting for a freight elevator to take us up to the booze can du nuit, when a scrappy, short guy told us to keep quiet or we'd get busted.Where did this small fry get off telling us to shut up?"Ssssh. It's Mel Gibson!" someone said.We shut up. No way were we going to grapple with Mad Max.And no way was he 5 foot 11. We were looking down on his scalp during the entire ride on the freight elevator.The Best Supporting Actor nominees Ed Harris and Paul Newman are both 5 foot 9. John C. Reilly is 6 foot 1 and Christopher Walken is an even 6 feet.We don't know exactly how long and lanky Chris Cooper is, but his lack of teeth in Adaptation should net him the award.Newman's long-time buddy and erstwhile co-star Robert Redford, Oscar winner for Ordinary People, is reportedly one inch taller than him at 5 foot 10.It must be 5 foot 10 Canadian. We met Redford when he was in town in 1988 for The Milagro Beanfield War and we towered over him, even though the heels of Redford's cowboy boots were higher than ours.You know that Woody Allen and Danny DeVito are short; it's part of their schtick. But surprisingly, some over-testosteroned action stars don't make the 6 foot mark. Sly Stallone and Jean Claude Van Damme are both 5 foot 10.We could take them.And it must really gall Stallone that his brother Frank, star of such memorable films as The Pink Chiquitas, has two inches on him.There are your standard issue tall leading man guys, too. Tom Selleck is 6 foot 4 inches while Sean Connery and Arnold Schwarzenegger hover around and above 6 foot 2.One of the reasons they call Chris Noth Mr. Big on Sex And The City is because he is a big boy. Noth, who also stands 6 foot 2 inches tall, had to duck his head in order to clear the door to the dining room at Bistro 990.Then there is the Alan Ladd Syndrome. Ladd, who was 5 foot 5 inches short, had to stand on boxes so he'd be in the same frame as his co-stars. Sometimes they'd even put the co-stars into specially excavated ditches.Something like that must have gone down on the set of Batman & Robin. In some scenes, George Clooney, 5 foot 11 inches, was clearly shorter than Elle "The Body" Macpherson, who is 6 feet tall.Then, as the result of FX or some exotic growth hormone, there was Clooney, in the podium scene, towering over Macpherson in all her babeliciousness.Al Pacino, Oscar winner for Scent Of A Woman, is 5 foot 6, even though the IMDB claims he is 5 foot 11. We want some of whatever the statisticians on IMDB are smoking.We had interviewed Pacino in New York for Sea Of Love and was standing outside the Regency Hotel shortly thereafter, hooking up with a pal. Pacino came out of the hotel with his entourage and before getting into his waiting limo, turned and said, "Hello again, Rita, nice to meet you.""Who was that," my friend demanded."That was Al Pacino," I said somewhat smugly."But he's so short," she protested."That's okay," I said, "he can stand on his wallet."Then again, one could always put height in the perspective of Gloria Swanson, who played a fading movie queen in Sunset Boulevard. "I am big," she said imperiously."It's the pictures that got small."
Additional articles by Rita Zekas
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