Welcome to the lucky 13th annual Os-Caro Quiz, devised to boggle the mightiest wizard and perplex the most crazed genius. Will you survive this extreme test or succumb to the dark temptation . . . of looking up the answers at the end?
1) If “The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring” wins the top prize, it would be the Best Picture winner with the longest title ever. Which previous winner has the longest title? (Count letters only.)
2) Does “The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring” have the longest title of any movie ever nominated for Best Picture?
3) What previous Best Picture nominee had the shortest title?
4) Which one of the following is not a title shared by two different Best Picture nominees?
a. “Moulin Rouge”
b. “Ben-Hur”
c. “Cleopatra”
d. “Heaven Can Wait”
e. “Romeo and Juliet”
5) “The Lord of the Rings” led the nominations field this year with 13. Which one of the following movies did not receive 13 nominations?
a. “Gone With the Wind”
b. “From Here to Eternity”
c. “Ben-Hur”
d. “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”
e. “Shakespeare in Love”
6) Which one of the above films did not win a Best Picture Oscar?
7) Which of the following is not true of Robert Redford, who will receive an honorary Oscar this year?
a. He was the original choice to star in “The Graduate.”
b. He was nominated for Best Actor for “The Sting.”
c. He was cast in “The Great Gatsby” after Marlon Brando and Warren Beatty said no.
d. He turned down the lead role in “Apocalypse Now.”
e. He has never won a competitive Oscar.
8) Which of the following is not true of Sidney Poitier, who also will receive an honorary Oscar this year?
a. He is the former brother-in-law of light-heavyweight boxing champion Archie Moore.
b. He spent one summer as a smelt fisherman.
c. He’s a former Oscar show host.
d. On one Oscar telecast, he performed the nominated song “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” with Ingrid Bergman and the UCLA Marching Band.
e. He once co-starred with Robert Redford in a movie.
9) Ian McKellen is a Best Supporting Actor nominee for playing the wizard Gandalf in “The Lord of the Rings.” If he wins, would he be the first Oscar winner who played someone with magical powers? (Forrest Gump doesn’t count.)
10-16. Forget Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. The following Oscar-nominated actors can be linked in just two steps through the co-star of one movie. (For example, Nicole Kidman and Sean Penn are connected because Kidman starred in “Days of Thunder” (1990) with Tom Cruise, who starred in “Taps” (1981) with Penn.) See whether you can link the following actors in just two steps.
10) Helen Mirren and Will Smith
11) Ethan Hawke and Judi Dench
12) Halle Berry and Jon Voight
13) Ben Kingsley and Sissy Spacek
14) Jennifer Connelly and Marisa Tomei
15) Maggie Smith and Renee Zellweger
16) Denzel Washington and Ian McKellen
17) Which two of this year’s Best Actor contenders starred in different movies that shared the same name?
18) Which 1995 movie had three of this year’s supporting acting nominees in its cast?
19) Australians Nicole Kidman and Russell Crowe are Oscar nominees this year. Who was the first Australian to win an acting Oscar?
a. Patricia Neal
b. Mel Gibson
c. Cate Blanchett
d. Peter Finch
e. Geoffrey Rush
20) Christopher and Jonathan Nolan’s “Memento” script is a Best Original Screenplay contender even though the movie boasts no Oscar-nominated performances. Since the Academy divided the screenplay competitions into the Original and Adapted categories in 1974, how many Best Original Screenplay winners have had no nominated performances?
a. 0 b. 2 c. 4 d. 6 e. 7
21) In his debut film, “In the Bedroom,” director Todd Field oversaw three Oscar-nominated performances. What helmer directed four Oscar-nominated performances in his debut?
a. Orson Welles
b. Bob Fosse
c. Robert Redford
d. James L. Brooks
e. Kevin Costner
22) If 77-year-old Robert Altman wins the Best Director prize, he would become the oldest winner in the category. Who currently holds that distinction?
a. George Cukor
b. John Huston
c. George Stevens
d. Billy Wilder
e. William Wyler
23) Judi Dench and Kate Winslet both are nominated this year for playing the same character, Iris Murdoch, in “Iris.” Who are the only other two performers to be nominated for playing the same character in the same movie?
24) Which current acting nominee appeared in three movies that netted Best Actress nominations this year?
25) Match the Oscar acceptance speech excerpt to the speaker:
a. “It has been a long journey to this moment.”
b. “As a little kid I lived in the projects, and you’re the people I watched; you’re the people that made me want to be an actor.”
c. “My son said he was going to make one of these out of clay for me; now I’ve got the model for him.”
d. “I sincerely hope I shall always be a credit to my race and to the motion-picture industry.”
e. “I’d like to accept this award in the name of Nelson Mandela.”
f. “I’ve got a spirit that guides me, starting from a great-grandmother who died at the age of 117.”
g. “Everybody who’s involved with this, I love you, I love you.”
I. Whoopi Goldberg
II. Cuba Gooding Jr.
III. Louis Gossett Jr.
IV. Hattie McDaniel
V. Sidney Poitier
VI. Denzel Washington
VII. Stevie Wonder
THE ANSWERS
1. “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” (1975) and “All Quiet on the Western Front” (1929-30) each has 25 letters ; we could give it to “Cuckoo’s Nest” on the apostrophe tie-breaker.
2. No, that honor goes to “Dr. Strangelove, or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb” (1964).
3. “Z” (1969).
4. b. The 1925 film “Ben-Hur” preceded the creation of the Academy Awards. “Moulin Rouge” was John Huston’s 1952 Best Picture nominee about the life of artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec; “Cleopatra” was the name of 1934 and 1963 nominees; “Romeo and Juliet” movies were nominated in 1936 and 1968, and “Heaven Can Wait” had nominated incarnations in 1943 and 1978.
5. c. “Ben-Hur” received 12 nominations and won a record 11 Oscars.
6. d. “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” lost the 1966 Best Picture Oscar to “A Man for All Seasons.”
7. e. Although not awarded as an actor, he won the 1980 Best Director and Best Picture prizes for “Ordinary People.”
8. b. Smelt fishing is not on Poitier’s resume. He did co-host the 1968 awards show (in April 1969) and performed “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” that night. He and Redford co-starred in “Sneakers” (1992).
9. No, Julie Andrews won Best Actress for playing the magical nanny in “Mary Poppins” (1964).
10. Mirren starred in “Teaching Mrs. Tingle” (1999) with Vivica Fox, who co-starred in “Independence Day” (1996) with Smith.
11. Hawke starred in “Great Expectations” (1998) with Gwyneth Paltrow, who starred in “Shakespeare in Love” (1998) with Dench.
12. Berry starred in “Monster’s Ball” (2001) with Billy Bob Thornton, who starred in “U Turn” (1997) with Voight.
13. Kingsley co-starred in “Dave” (1993) with Kevin Kline, who co-starred in “Violets are Blue . . . ” (1986) with Spacek.
14. Connelly co-starred in “Once Upon a Time in America” (1984) with Joe Pesci, who starred in “My Cousin Vinny” (1992) with Tomei.
15. Smith co-starred in “Murder By Death” (1976) with James Cromwell, who co-starred in “The Bachelor” (1999) with Zellweger.
16. Washington starred in “Crimson Tide” (1995) with Viggo Mortensen, who co-starred in “The Lord of the Rings” (2001) with McKellen.
17. Sean Penn starred in the 1983 juvenile prison drama “Bad Boys,” and Will Smith starred in the 1995 buddy movie “Bad Boys.”
18. “Richard III,” starring Ian McKellen and featuring Maggie Smith and Jim Broadbent.
19. d. Peter Finch won Best Actor for “Network” (1976). Gibson and Blanchett haven’t won acting Oscars, and Neal isn’t Australian.
20. a. 0
21. d. Shirley MacLaine and Debra Winger were Best Actress nominees and Jack Nicholson and John Lithgow were Best Supporting Actor nominees for James L. Brooks’ “Terms of Endearment” (1983). MacLaine and Nicholson won, as did Brooks and his movie.
22. a. George Cukor was 65 when he won for “My Fair Lady” (1964).
23. Best Actress nominee Winslet and Best Supporting Actress nominee Gloria Stuart both played Rose in “Titanic” (1997).
24. Jim Broadbent, a Best Supporting Actor nominee for “Iris” (opposite nominee Judi Dench), also appeared in “Moulin Rouge” with Nicole Kidman and “Bridget Jones’s Diary” with Renee Zellweger.
25. a. V; b. I; c. VI; d. IV; e. VII; f. III; g. II
Sources: “70 Years of the Oscar,” Robert Osborne (Abbeville Press); Internet Movie Database; AC Nielsen EDI’s “Academy Awards Guide”; “Inside Oscar,” Mason Wiley and Damien Bona, and “Inside Oscar 2,” Bona (both Ballantine).
