Russell Crowe objects to Joan Collins (1 Viewer)

[Ryan Peter]

Just give me my 8 bucks worth at the theater.

As long as you're not sitting by him in the theater and you happen to sneeze during the movie and he takes you outside and screams at you, I see what you mean.

 

[Terrell]

:rolleyes

 

[Vickie_M]

Oh geez, after having just watched the BAFTAs on E!, I can say now that Crowe's acceptance speech was humble, moving, short and to the point. He read a 4-line poem by Patrick Kavanaugh (NOT a poem that Crowe wrote himself, which is a very unfair lie that should be stamped out).
Here is what was cut out of the BBC broadcast of his 1 minute, 50 second acceptance speech, coming after his thank yous to the BAFTAs, and the people involved with making A Beautiful Mind. If I were Crowe I'd be pissed off too. This is really really nice!
"Western cultures are often criticised for their focus on performing arts. However, singing, dance, theatre, film and all forms of creative expression serve to ignite the intellect, propel emotional development and availability, and reward us all with stories of humanity and the triumph of the human spirit. I am grateful there is a Sydney, I am ecstatic there is a Sydney Opera House. I love my job. I don't think I do it that well. But keep on disagreeing with me if you like.
"Richard Harris, one of the finest of this profession, recently brought to my attention the verse of Patrick Kavanagh:
'To be a poet and not know the trade,
To be a lover and repel all women,
Twin ironies by which great saints are made,
The agonising pincher jaws of heaven.'"
Crowe's actions after the ceremony might be unfortunate, but at the same time they're being blown up, taken out of context of what his beef was really about, and woefully exaggerated.
========
This tells Crowe's side of the story:
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/20...704967173.html
Russell Crowe speaks his mind, from the heart
Russell Crowe has responded to the British tabloids' version of his argument with BBC director Malcolm Gerrie, who was responsible for cutting part of Crowe's Best Actor acceptance speech at the British Academy of Film and Television Awards.
Speaking to The Age in Sydney where he is promoting his latest film, A Beautiful Mind, Crowe said he had exchanged words with Gerrie on Sunday night after realising more than half of his one-minute-and-50-second speech had been edited out of the British telecast.
The Sun quoted Crowe as telling Gerrie, 51, "I'll make sure you never work in Hollywood" in a tirade in a storage room, to which he had been escorted by two of Crowe's security men.
Crowe won the award for his portrayal of troubled maths genius John Forbes Nash, for which he has also received an Oscar nomination.
"As it's being reported in the English press, it's all come down to the removal of a four-line Patrick Kavanagh poem. But the thing is that it was about a one-minute-50 speech but they've cut a minute out of it, including thanking John and Alicia Nash for allowing us to explore their extraordinary lives."
As well as removing his gratitude to the Nashes, the edited version of the speech also left out a broader statement of support to the performing arts community, comments "acknowledging my home country", and a tribute to Crowe's Gladiator co-star Richard Harris "one of my mentors and one of the greatest ... so it's not just four lines".
"I just fundamentally disagreed with that decision ... if you were organising your timings as a producer for an awards show like that, then you're always building towards a certain area of the awards show. If you haven't allowed at least two minutes per person at that end of the show, you're doing a very incompetent job.
"I was dumbfounded and I was also heartbroken, one that it happened and two, when I sought some sort of satisfaction in terms of an apology or empathy that this moment should be more about content and less about a timing issue, I didn't get any response from this man who said it was his responsibility.
"I'll grant you that my delivery might not have been perfect, but these are very adrenalised situations and this is a very short statement from the heart."
Crowe said he did not think that anybody should necessarily have to be subjected to what he had to say.
"But at a time like that, isn't it about the moment? Isn't it about the person whose name was just announced?
"So do I regret having the conversation with him? No. Do I still think two days later that the point I was making was valid? Absolutely.
"And the thing is, if his response was a little bit more empathetic then it probably wouldn't have gone up another gear. But this whole thing of couching it in terms of a British gangster movie is just bollocks.
Gentlemen don't have a conversation like that in front of 3000 other people and he knew perfectly well what we were going off to talk about. And it was my request that I have the conversation with him and to have it in private."
The BBC has promised to show Crowe's acceptance speech in full in a worldwide telecast. Crowe will be in Melbourne tonight at the Rivoli Cinemas to promote the film which opens in Australia next Thursday.

 

[Vickie_M]

Sigh...I can't believe I spelled Crowe's name wrong in the Subject Line!

 

[Steeve Bergeron]

The latest posts in this thread are hilarious!

Please, more!

 

[Bruce Hedtke]

Say what you want about the guy, but he is a welcome breath of air in Hollywood. In a time when so many people are afraid to speak their minds or even hint at critizing anyone for fear of being labeled "difficult" and not getting work, Crowe is out there, in the spotlight and he isn't pulling any punches.

Bruce

 

[Vickie_M]

...the fight Russell Crowe recently had at BAFTA (which, I believe, is the British equivalent of America's Academy Awards) over the deletion of Crowe's poem he read after accepting the night's best actor award,

It was NOT CROWE'S POEM. That's the kind of misrepresentation that makes a situation like this look much worse than it is. It was a 4 line poem by Patrick Kavanaugh that was, in context, germaine to what Crowe was saying in his acceptance speech.

I've never felt much of a need to defend Crowe about anything he does in his personal life, but this story is getting out of hand, even to the point that he could lose an Oscar over it. After having seen the entire acceptance speech at the BAFTAs, I'm shocked that the BBC cut anything out. The speech was not that long, and it was articulate, humble, heartfelt and moving.

 

[Sam R. Aucoin]

Terrell:

As you said, reporting incidents such as the one with Mr. Crowe always runs into a semantics problem. But NEVER did I imply that blood was spilt, as you suggested earlier. Many people have fights (defined in my book as involving unwanted physical contact between two or more people where the people delivering the physical contact intend to do some type of harm to the other) and no blood is shed.

Vickie:

You read too much into what I said. When I said "Crowe's poem", I did not mean that he penned the damned thing. I was referring to the fact that it was a poem READ BY CROWE that was cut. Thus, "Crowe's poem was cut".

If I received an award at a ceremony and started to read part of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address speech and was cut off midstream because of commercial demands, I doubt that people would say that "Lincoln's Gettysburg Address speech was cut in midstream" - they would say that "Sam Aucoin's speech was cut in midstream".

 

[Terrell]

The latest posts in this thread are hilarious! Please more!

 

[Ryan Peter]

Terrell and I should go on the road and do a vaudville act.
Ryan: "I read in the papers today that Russell Crowe beat up a nun who asked him for an autograph"
Terrell: "As long as he shows up for the big screen, he's aces with me!"
Ryan: "If I had seen that I'd have punched him in the nose!"
Terrell: "How about I punch you in the nose?"

 

[Terrell]

 

[Seth Paxton]

So now IMDb runs ANOTHER anti-Crowe story by reporting Dennis Quaid's feelings on Crowe.

Why now? I have no idea.

But I know I'm not the only person that feels a bit of a smear campaign going now. At first I thought "boy, that Crowe is really doing it to himself" after reading 2 stories (Duvall reaction and BAFTA thing), but after reading Crowe's reaction and this unusual Quaid story popping up it makes me wonder.

I think Crowe doesn't have a lid on his temper for sure, but didn't the "flipping the girl off on the ABM set" story come out last year during the Oscar run as well, or was it shortly after it??

Seems a bit odd.

 

[Sean Oneil]

I still think the oscar is his. It's still about the best performance of the year, nothing else. If it was all about giving the oscar to someone who is well liked in Hollywood then Kevin Bacon would probably have an oscar by now.

 

[Terrell]

I don't! And I agree with Seth that there seems to be negative spins on him during Oscar time, this one especially. Maybe the media doesn't like him. As for Quaid, well who wouldn't know what he thought. The fact is the Academy does take into account whether they like a guy or not, and there's no way he wins this time. It's a done deal. Crowe loses the Oscar. You heard it here first!
As for learning a bit more about what went on in the most recent episode, Crowes' behavior was unbecoming to say the least. But the BAFTA producer was wrong to cut off a 1:50 minute speech as well. I wish he would have gone about voicing his displeasure a little more discreetly. I guess he thought he did.

 

[Chuck Mayer]

He still comes off like an egomaniac...but so are most prima donna actors. As has been said, at least Crowe is talented.
That said, Bacon has performed to an Oscar level before(Murder In The First)...but there's always a bit of baggage. And actors do pick favorites
Take care,
Chuck

 

[Terrell]

I will say this for Crowe, regardless of some of his more silly behavior, I've read that when on set he's a consumate professional, and not a prima donna at all. I've heard horror stories about a number of actors who request every little perk and fancy trailers. I hate that. He just needs to be more behaved off the set.

 

[Seth Paxton]

You have to have a performance that can be rewarded as well, not just be likeable.

It's not about "the best" because that is so hard to determine. At the best it's about "my favorite" or "what I thought was best" which in many ways is the same thing.

But what if 2 people are in a toss-up? That's where Crowe loses votes. Picking Denzel over him is not picking an average effort over a good effort, it's just going with another very strong effort. Denzel has already been rewarded by other critical groups, so the implication that Crowe is the only nominee with the "winning" calliber performance is crazy.

If Crowe was way out in front then he'd be fine. Crowe needs the Guild win for me to think it's still a toss-up between them.

If Bacon came with another Murder in the First level of performance he WOULD be highly in the running because of how much work he has done and for being likeable, and it would give him the advantage over previous winners and newcomers if the performances were regarded as near equals.

 

[Terrell]

Crowe needs the Guild win for me to think it's still a toss-up between them.

Hmm, are you saying that Washington is in the lead? Because Crowe has won by far more awards for his performance than Washington has. I still say Crowe has blown it with his outburst, even if it has been blown completely out of proportion. But before the outburst by Crowe, he was pretty much the odds on favorite. He's won about every award except one, which Washington won. Can someone list all the awards show so far and who won those for best actor?

As for Washington, great actor. But I didn't feel his part was nearly as demanding or difficult to pull off as Crowe's was. A strong performance, but his Training Day roles doesn't come close to his best ever effort.

 

[Spero D]

Russel just apologised. I like the guy and hope he wins the Oscar-
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/entertainment/story_5375.asp
Spero D.

 

[Terrell]

I like the guy too. I'm glad he was man enough to apologize. But after hearing what happened and reading Vickie's post, I can understand why he got angry. The stuff that got cut seemed very important to me if I had been in his shoes. As I said before, if you can't even allot 2 minutes for the winner of the Best Actor award, you ought to be yelled at. If the Oscars can allot forever, BAFTA should be able to allot 2 minutes. That doesn't excuse Crowe's bad behavior, but it certainly makes it more understandable for me. Regardless, I'm glad he apologized.
But, he's lost the Academy Award.