The Oscars are less than 96 hours away, so you only have a limited amount of time to brag about your insane knowledge of Academy Awards history. Ready for a brutal 21-question foray into Oscar's grisly past? Let's roll. (We give you the questions on the first page. Jot down your responses, then check the answers, along with the accompanying questions, on the next page. The videos embedded here aren't related to the questions. They're just fun!)
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1. What ’90s Best Actor winner gave the shortest onscreen performance ever nominated (and therefore awarded) in that category? This is measured by total minutes and seconds spent onscreen.
2. The first (and so far only) black female nominee in the Best Original Screenplay category was a co-writer of what biopic released in the 1970s?
3. From 1937 to 1945, the Academy guaranteed nominations in one particular category to any studio that submitted a qualifiable entry. What was the category?
4. Glenn Close has been nominated six times for an Academy Award and has never won. Amazingly, in 1994, Close presented an honorary Oscar to another six-time loser. Who was it?
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjoNucs20Vw]
5. Two different roles – one male, one female – have earned actors a total of three Oscar nominations apiece, making them the most nominated “characters.” Who are these characters and what do they have in common?
6. Sandy Dennis, who earned an Oscar for “Who”s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”, won her first of two Tonys for this 1962 play. Its subsequent film adaptation was nominated for Best Picture and earned one performer a Best Supporting Actor statue. Both the play and the movie starred the same man, who would later win consecutive Best Supporting Actor trophies. In Best Picture winner “Ordinary People,” the character of Karen (Dinah Manoff) tells Jarrett (Timothy Hutton) that she”s in rehearsal for a school production of the play. What”s the title?
7. Which three female singers with four-letter names have been nominated for Oscars?
8. Speaking of letter counts: Name the two five-letter movies that won Best Original Screenplay Oscars in the 1990s, the two four-letter movies that won Best Original Screenplay Oscars in the 2000s, and the one three-letter movie that won a Best Original Screenplay Oscar in the 2010s.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqSEH_bVRz8]
9. Who”s the only performer to receive a Best Actor nomination for a movie directed by Alfred Hitchcock?
10. In 1951, Bette Davis and Anne Baxter squared off in the Best Actress category for their performances in “All About Eve.” Both actresses lost to Judy Holliday in “Born Yesterday,” but they share another connection: Both Davis and Baxter had previously starred in adaptations of one author”s work that garnered both of them acclaim (and one Oscar win). Who is the author?
11. What chanteuse holds the distinction of having sung three different Oscar-winning songs in their original soundtrack versions? In two of these songs, she served as one half of a duet.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2zjm79Esq4]
12. Speaking of Best Original Song, what reclusive children's author scored a nomination for “I'm Checkin' Out,” Meryl Streep's climactic tune in “Postcards from the Edge”?
13. Meryl Streep has twice been Oscar-nominated for playing real-life women with the same given first name. What is it?
14. Back to children's authors: Mary Steenburgen earned a Best Supporting Actress Oscar in 1980, but she was snubbed a nomination three years later for playing author Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings in “Cross Creek.” What other actress, who now stars on a network television drama, did earn a nomination for “Cross Creek,” becoming only the sixth African-American woman ever nominated for Best Supporting Actress?
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73fz_uK-vhs]
15. Which two Best Supporting Actress winners have hosted (or co-hosted) the Oscars more than once?
16. Which of the original “Saturday Night Live” cast members was the first to score an Oscar nomination after leaving the show? Tougher bonus: Which two short-stint cast members earned nominations before “SNL” even premiered?
17. Who's the only female “Saturday Night Live” alum to earn multiple Oscar nominations?
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IIl3zSYL8k]
18. Who congratulated screenwriter Diablo Cody, also a fan of horror, on her Oscar win with a note reading, “Maybe someday you”ll have six like me.” (He has since won his seventh.)
19. Who did Sean Penn call “the phoenix” in his Best Actor speech for “Milk”?
20. Name two of the three woman to win Best Actress trophies for characters named (and billed as) “Annie.”
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3Pl-qvA1X8]
21. Finally, fill in the blanks of this infamous Oscar speech.
My dear colleagues, I thank you very, very much for this tribute to my work. I think that ____(1)____ and I have done the best work of our lives and I think this was in part due to our director, Fred Zinnemann. And I also think it's in part because we believed and we believe in what we were expressing. Two, out of millions, who gave their lives and were prepared to sacrifice everything in the fight against fascist and racist Nazi Germany. And I salute you and I pay tribute to you and I think you should be very proud that in the last few weeks you've stood firm and you have refused to be intimidated by the threats of a small bunch of ____(2)___ ____(3)____ whose behavior is an insult to the stature of Jews all over the world and to their great and heroic record of struggle against fascism and oppression. And I salute that record, and I salute all of you for having stood firm and dealt a final blow against that period when ____(4)____ and McCarthy launched a worldwide witch hunt against those who tried to express in their lives and their work the truth that they believed in. I salute you, and I thank you, and I pledge to you that I will continue to fight against ____(5)____ and fascism. Thank you.
1. What ’90s Best Actor winner gave the shortest onscreen performance ever nominated (and therefore awarded) in that category? This is measured by total minutes and seconds spent onscreen.
A: Anthony Hopkins in “The Silence of the Lambs” (16 minutes, 10 seconds onscreen)
2. The first (and so far only) black female nominee in the Best Original Screenplay category was a cowriter of what biopic released in the 1970s?
A: “Lady Sings the Blues” (Suzanne de Passe)
3. From 1937 to 1945, the Academy guaranteed nominations in one particular category to any studio that submitted a qualifiable entry. What was the category?
A: Best Original Score
4. Glenn Close has been nominated six times for an Academy Award and has never won. Amazingly, in 1994, Close presented an honorary Oscar to another six-time loser. Who was it?
A: Deborah Kerr
5. Two different roles – one male, one female – have earned actors a total of three Oscar nominations apiece, making them the most nominated “characters.” Who are these characters and what do they have in common?
A: King Henry VIII and Queen Elizabeth I. They're father and daughter.
6. Sandy Dennis, who earned an Oscar for “Who”s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”, won her first of two Tonys for this 1962 play. Its subsequent film adaptation was nominated for Best Picture and earned one performer a Best Supporting Actor statue. Both the play and the movie starred the same man, who would later win consecutive Best Supporting Actor trophies. In Best Picture winner “Ordinary People,” the character of Karen (Dinah Manoff) tells Jarrett (Timothy Hutton) that she”s in rehearsal for a school production of the play. What”s the title?
A: “A Thousand Clowns.” Martin Balsam won Best Supporting Actor in '65, and Jason Robards starred in the play and film versions.
7. Which three singers with four-letter names have been nominated for Oscars?
A: Cher (for “Silkwood” and “Moonstruck”), Enya (“May It Be” from “Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring”), and Dido (for the song “If I Rise” from “127 Hours”). Altogether there is one other four-letter nominee, the actor/voice artist Mako for Best Supporting Actor in “The Sand Pebbles.”
8. Speaking of letter counts: Name the two five-letter movies that won Best Original Screenplay Oscars in the 1990s, the two four-letter movies that won Best Original Screenplay Oscars in the 2000s, and the one three-letter movie that won a Best Original Screenplay Oscar in the 2010s.
A: “Ghost” and “Fargo”, “Juno” and “Milk”, and “Her”
9. Who”s the only performer to receive a Best Actor nomination for a movie directed by Alfred Hitchcock?
A: Laurence Olivier for “Rebecca”
10. In 1951, Bette Davis and Anne Baxter squared off in the Best Actress category for their performances in “All About Eve.” Both actresses lost to Judy Holliday in “Born Yesterday,” but they share another connection: Both Davis and Baxter had previously starred in adaptations of one author”s work that garnered both of them acclaim (and one Oscar win). Who is the author?
A: W. Somerset Maugham (Bette earned raves and a pseudo-technical “write-in” nomination for “Of Human Bondage” in '32, and Anne Baxter won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar in '46 for “The Razor's Edge”)
11. What chanteuse holds the distinction of having sung three different Oscar-winning songs in their original soundtrack versions? In two of these songs, she served as one half of a duet.
A: Jennifer Warnes (“It Goes Like It Goes” from “Norma Rae,” “Up Where We Belong” from “An Officer and a Gentleman” with Joe Cocker, “(I”ve Had) The Time of My Life” from “Dirty Dancing” with Bill Medley)
12. Speaking of Best Original Song, what reclusive children's author scored a nomination for “I'm Checkin' Out,” Meryl Streep's climactic tune in “Postcards from the Edge”?
A: Shel Silverstein
13. Meryl Streep has twice been Oscar-nominated for playing real-life women with the same given first name. What is it?
A: Karen (Karen Silkwood in “Silkwood” and Karen Blixen in “Out of Africa”)
14. Back to children's authors: Mary Steenburgen earned a Best Supporting Actress Oscar in 1980, but she was snubbed a nomination three years later for playing author Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings in “Cross Creek.” What other actress, who now stars on a network television drama, did earn a nomination for “Cross Creek,” becoming only the sixth African-American woman ever nominated for Best Supporting Actress?
A: Alfre Woodard
15. Which two Best Supporting Actress winners have hosted (or co-hosted) the Oscars more than once?
A: Whoopi Goldberg and Goldie Hawn
16. Which of the original “Saturday Night Live” cast members was the first to score an Oscar nomination after leaving the show? Tougher bonus: Which two short-stint cast members earned nominations before “SNL” even premiered?
A: Dan Aykroyd for “Driving Miss Daisy.” Bonus: George Coe (Best Short Film – Live Action, “De Düva: The Dove”) and the marvelous Randy Quaid (“The Last Detail”)
17. Who's the only female “Saturday Night Live” alum to earn multiple Oscar nominations?
A: Joan Cusack
18. Who congratulated screenwriter Diablo Cody, also a fan of horror, on her Oscar win with a note reading, “Maybe someday you”ll have six like me.” (He has since won his seventh.)
A: Makeup artist Rick Baker
19. Who did Sean Penn call “the phoenix” in his Best Actor speech for “Milk”?
A: Fellow nominee and comeback king Mickey Rourke
20. Name two of the three woman to win Best Actress trophies for characters named “Annie.”
A: Anne Bancroft (Annie Sullivan in “The Miracle Worker”) Diane Keaton (“Annie Hall”), and Kathy Bates (Annie Wilkes in “Misery”)
21. Finally, fill in the blanks of this infamous Oscar speech.
My dear colleagues, I thank you very, very much for this tribute to my work. I think that ____(1)____ and I have done the best work of our lives and I think this was in part due to our director, Fred Zinnemann. And I also think it's in part because we believed and we believe in what we were expressing. Two, out of millions, who gave their lives and were prepared to sacrifice everything in the fight against fascist and racist Nazi Germany. And I salute you and I pay tribute to you and I think you should be very proud that in the last few weeks you've stood firm and you have refused to be intimidated by the threats of a small bunch of ____(2)___ ____(3)____ whose behavior is an insult to the stature of Jews all over the world and to their great and heroic record of struggle against fascism and oppression. And I salute that record, and I salute all of you for having stood firm and dealt a final blow against that period when ____(4)____ and McCarthy launched a worldwide witch hunt against those who tried to express in their lives and their work the truth that they believed in. I salute you, and I thank you, and I pledge to you that I will continue to fight against ____(5)____ and fascism. Thank you.
A: 1) Jane Fonda 2) Zionist 3) Hoodlums 4) Nixon 5) Anti-Semitism (The speech is Vanessa Redgrave's from her '77 “Julia” win)
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAcOsK9gRLk]
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