While Adrien Brody may have been a “big winner” at Sunday night’s Academy Awards, for scoring a rare second best actor Oscar, an industry expert said he was a “big loser” for giving a long, rambling and self-important speech that annoyed a lot of people at the ceremony and online.
Brody’s speech was, in fact, so long — five minutes and 40 seconds — that it broke an Oscars record for the longest speech given by a winner in the Academy’s 97-year history. Accepting the award for playing a Holocaust survivor in “The Brutalist,” Brody twice demanded that the orchestra stop trying to play him off so he could go on for a couple extra minutes — a move that was seen as a show of arrogance, despite the actor’s repeated expressions of gratitude. The rest of the speech came off as “insufferable” and “abominable” to critics, as Bloomberg News entertainment reporter Lucas Shaw said.
Speaking on The Town podcast this week, Shaw said: “I’ve heard from way more people about how bad his speech was than anything during that show. It was painful for everyone watching.”
The Town’s host Matthew Belloni concurred, suggesting that the speech may be a reflection of who Brody is. Belloni, also founder of politics and entertainment newsletter Puck, proclaimed that Brody does not have “the greatest reputation in town for being a good guy.”
In his speech, Brody talked about the “tremendous outpouring of love” he has felt from the world. He also thanked his girlfriend, Georgina Chapman, for reinvigorating his sense of “self-worth” and then called for the end of war, systematic oppression, antisemitism and racism. But even this part of his speech, which was supposed to be an inspiring call for global peace, tolerance and kindness, was unfocused and lacking in substance, according to pop culture writer Kaleigh Donaldson.
Actually before jumping up to the stage to accept his Oscar, Brody raised eyebrows by pulling a wad of chewing gum from his mouth and throwing it to Chapman to hold. After that, the bulk of his speech was given over to vague references to his own career struggles in Hollywood, which was telling, according to Belloni and Shaw.
“You know, acting is a very fragile profession,” Brody said. “It looks very glamorous. … (but) no matter what you’ve accomplished it can all go away and I think what makes this night most special is the awareness of that and the gratitude that I have to still to do the work that I love.”
Both Shaw and Matthew Belloni said Brody was clearly referring to the fact that his career didn’t exactly take off after he won his first best actor Oscar in 2003 for playing another Holocaust survivor in “The Pianist.” Brody set another record in 2003 — at age 29, becoming the youngest ever best actor recipient. While he continued to work in TV and movies, Shaw and Belloni implied that he didn’t work at the level one might expect from an Oscar winner who would eventually go to win a second prize 23 years later.
Belloni said that Brody’s reputation in Hollywood may have impacted “how his career has gone for the past 20 years.” He also said, “Don’t know. (There are) lots of guys who are not great but who have great careers.”
Belloni didn’t go into specifics on Brody’s reputation issues, but he thought his personality “came out during his speech.” He added: “I think there are a lot of people who said, ‘can I take my vote back?’”
Shaw acknowledged Brody’s accomplishment, saying that winning two best actor trophies puts him in the rare company of 10 “legends.” They include Jack Nicholson, Daniel Day-Lewis, Tom Hanks, as well as Dustin Hoffman and Marlon Brando and going all the way back to Fredric March, Spencer Tracy and Gary Cooper. Nonetheless, Brody’s career was “unremarkable” in between in his two Oscar-winning movies, Shaw said, raising questions about why that’s the case.
Now, Brody may have ruined the “good will” people had for him with his comeback in a prestige, Oscar-nominated film like “The Brutalist.” Writing for the Daily Beast, Donaldson said “Viewers weren’t entertained. In an evening with many lovely, attention-grabbing, and charismatic speeches, Brody felt out of step with the tone of the ceremony.”
If Brody was being self-important, Donaldson agreed that it’s not bad to be “uber-serious about your craft.” Peers respect colleagues who are serious, she said. “But it takes real charm and planning to convey that in the moment without descending into smothering smugness,” she said. “And to do it over the course of close to six minutes?!”