Sometimes less is so much more.
As Oscar season begins, we often overlook a salient fact: Some of the most memorable scenes in motion pictures belong to minor characters. But nobody gives an award for best bit player.
Maybe they should. By honoring the walk-on roles with an extra category, Academy members would no longer be tempted to upgrade certain performances to “supporting” status just to honor big stars in tiny roles.
So let us sing the praises of the walk-on role and the actors who make them immortal. As an addendum to the recently announced Oscar nominees, we add five more vying for best cameo.
LYNN REDGRAVE
“Kinsey”
The film’s would-be slam-dunk Oscar winner is contained in just one key scene at the end of this biopic. As Indiana sex researcher Alfred Kinsey finds his career and his health in shambles, he encounters a middle-age woman. Played with subtle but stirring effectiveness by Redgrave, she explains to Dr. Kinsey how his groundbreaking book about women’s sexuality helped her understand her attraction to another woman, leading her out of addiction to a path of love and acceptance. “You saved my life, sir,” she sums up.
ALANIS MORISSETTE
“De-Lovely”
A “De-Lovely” nod is the Academy’s chance to celebrate the old-style musical, which was supposed to be on the rise again after “Moulin Rogue” and “Chicago,” remember? It would also be right in stride for Morissette, a multiple Grammy winner whose forays into celluloid are all about notable cameos. (She raised eyebrows playing God in “Dogma” five years before.) Here she puts her good looks together with her unconventional voice to perform a snappy version of Cole Porter’s “Let’s Do It, Let’s Fall in Love.”
NEIL PATRICK HARRIS
“Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle”
Upping his cool quotient by playing himself way against goodie-goodie Doogie-Howser type, Harris sends up his old image in umpteen ways, which include tripping on ecstasy and stealing the protagonists’ car. “The Doogie line always works on strippers,” he deadpans, revealing his seedy Don Juan ways. “Harold & Kumar,” despite its progressive racial politics, isn’t the kind of film that gets noticed by Academy Awards — but that’s the beauty of this new category.
BRUCE WILLIS
“Ocean’s Twelve”
Obtuse and self-congratulatory, this film picks up considerably midway, when Julia Roberts and Bruce Willis hop into the mix. Roberts plays a crook’s wife who happens to look just like, well, Julia Roberts — and hilarity ensues when “Julia” runs into Willis (playing himself) in a Parisian hotel. Briefly and innocently roped into a museum heist, Willis enjoys a droll running gag about his career, as other characters can’t resist telling him how they figured out the ending to “The Sixth Sense.”
JEFFREY WRIGHT
“The Manchurian Candidate”
Meryl Streep got all the buzz in last summer’s remake of the classic psycho-political thriller, but Tony and Emmy winner Wright deserves recognition as well. In his small but significant role as Corporal Melvin, a Gulf War vet haunted by his dreams, Wright sets the plot in motion when he pays a twitching visit to Denzel Washington. Unspooling yet heroic, Wright’s performance provides the first glimpse of the human cost of the conspiracy.
5 STARS FROM THE PAST THAT DESERVED GOLD
JOYCE GRENFELL
“Stage Fright” (1950)
Shot in London, this little-known Hitchcock confection compensates with an ace cast for what it lacks in shoddy plotting. Holding her own with some big guns is Grenfell, in a bit part as a comical doyenne volunteering as a carnival barker at a marksmanship booth with fowl targets. Her nameless character provides a key prop to one of the heroes as she drums up business: “Do come over and shoot some lovely ducks!” she calls over and over. “Well, it’s for the orphans, you know. You are sorry for the orphans, aren’t you?”
MARLENE DIETRICH
“Touch of Evil” (1958)
Sure, nobody would cast a Teutonic goddess as a Mexican fortuneteller today, but in 1958, Hollywood could get away with that sort of thing. (If Orson Welles couldn’t have Dietrich, the studio would’ve probably selected “The Wolf Man’s” Maria Ouspenskaya, and she doesn’t have the cheekbones.) Dietrich doesn’t do much besides look great beneath a veil of smoke and provide convenient foreshadowing — until the last scene of the film. She wistfully delivers the last lines, and in the process, makes Welles’ villainous cop seem like a human being.
DEAN STOCKWELL
“Blue Velvet” (1986)
Suave Ben is the epitome of a lounge lizard kind of cool, with his smoking jacket, ruffled tuxedo shirt and strange harem. But there’s a lot going on to what could have been a one-dimensional, one-scene character. Stockwell manages to convey a vague sense of menace and bring a touch of levity to this dark nightmare film, a groundbreaker from David Lynch. Whether he’s stomaching a sip of Pabst Blue Ribbon, threatening Kyle MacLachlan or ip-syncing Roy Orbison’s “In Dreams,” Suave Ben demands attention.
BILLY CRYSTAL
“The Princess Bride” (1987)
Mugging through six hours’ worth of makeup, Crystal nails his lone scene in this swashbuckling fairy tale spoof. He plays Miracle Max, a cranky old magician called out of retirement to revive the seemingly deceased hero (Cary Elwes). Full of wisecracks and a Yiddish accent, Max explains, “There’s a big difference between mostly dead and all dead.” Then he bickers with his wife (Carol Kane), in an even smaller, equally goofy cameo.
BAIN BOEHLKE
“Fargo” (1996)
In this Oscar-winner filled with darkly funny moments, Boehlke works comedy magic in under two minutes as Mr. Mohra, a Minnesota bartender who provides an unlikely but important tip to the police. Taking a break from shoveling snow, Boehlke unspools a hilarious, rambling recollection of a conversation with the killers (captured in a long single shot). We barely see his face, hidden by the hood of his winter coat, but Boehlke has a ball with Joel and Ethan Coen’s script.
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Who would YOU nominate for a best cameo Oscar?
E-mail us your pick for best cameo performance throughout movie history.
The nominees must have less than seven minutes of screen time and may appear in no more than three scenes. Send your submissions with “cameo” in the subject field to ctc-arts@tribune.com by Feb. 14, and we’ll publish results on Oscar Sunday, Feb. 27.
