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Was it a shock that he didn’t get a nomination for any of his three films? (To Sir with Love, Heat of the Night, Guess Who’s…)
Did he cancel himself out? Was he pushed more heavily for one film?
ReplyI don’t think he cancelled himself out – In the Heat of the Night is clearly what he would’ve garnered the nomination for. That was just one awfully crowded category.
Beyond the Oscar nominees, you also had Richard Harris in Camelot; Rex Harrison (ugh) in Doctor Dolittle; Richard Burton in The Taming of the Shrew; Albert Finney in Two for the Road; and Alan Bates in Far from the Madding Crowd.
OSCAR FLASHBACK: 20 Years of Streep (1985) – Out of Africa
ReplyCopy URLIf this was taking place in the modern era, you know that he would have been campaigned in supporting for Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, lead in In the Heat of the Night, and would have taken away his GWCTD costar Cecil Kellaway’s nomination, ultimately still losing to the scene-stealing George Kennedy.
ReplyCopy URLOn more time for the disappearing postings . . .
Was it a shock that he didn’t get a nomination for any of his three films? (To Sir with Love, Heat of the Night, Guess Who’s…)
Did he cancel himself out? Was he pushed more heavily for one film?
In addition to what Andrew Carden said . . .
He won Best Actor four years earlier in for his role in Lilies of the Field, in which he completely dominated the film. Not that an actor or actress wouldn’t get nominated again within a couple of years. There were others who did, but typically if they hadn’t won. To Sir, with Love didn’t get any recognition from the most significant awards: BAFTA, Golden Globe or AMPAS. All it got was a huge top-40 theme song hit on the US charts and a Grammy nomination for best film theme song. IMHO, it was perceived as a YA/teen movie and wasn’t taken seriously. Regarding Heat of the Night, Rod Steiger, the winner that year, had an exceptionally strong performance as the sheriff. Neither am I surprised by Spencer Tracy’s posthumous nomination for Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner. His performance and synergy with Katharine Hepburn, his decades long “significant other”, carried that film. IMO, Poitier wasn’t at the forefront of those two films, especially the latter one, as he was in Lilies of the Field. As good as Poitier was in both of them, his role as written in the screenplays wasn’t as strong as they were for Steiger and Tracy.
John
ReplyCopy URLOn a sort of unrelated note…..Did you ever notice how many soda ads there are in “In the Heat of the Night”?
at first I thought Coke must have invested heavily but there are tons of Pepsi signs too.
Didn’t look for the brand(s), but do recall there was an enormous amount of soda drinking (Coca Cola?), IIRC starting with Sheriff Gillespie (Rod Steiger).
John
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