A perfectionist in her craft and meticulous and painstaking in her preparation for her roles, Meryl turned out a string of highly acclaimed performances over the next 10 years in great films like Silkwood (1983); Out of Africa (1985); Ironweed (1987); and A Cry in the Dark (1988). Her career declined slightly in the early 1990s as a result of her inability to find suitable parts, but she shot back to the top in 1995 with her performance as Clint Eastwood's married lover in The Bridges of Madison County (1995) and as the prodigal daughter in Marvin's Room (1996). In 1998 she made her first venture into the area of producing, and was the executive producer for the moving ...First Do No Harm (1997) (TV). A realist when she talks about her future years in film, she remarked that "...no matter what happens, my work will stand..."
The Iron Lady (2011)
Tells the story of a woman who smashed through the barriers of gender and class to be heard in a male-dominated world. The story concerns power and the price that is paid for power, and is a surprising and insightful portrait of an extraordinary and complex woman.
Meryl Streep wins best actress Oscar for ‘Iron Lady’
ASSOCIATED PRESS
February 26, 2012 3:14PM
Meryl Streep arrives before the
84th Academy Awards on Sunday, Feb. 26, 2012, in the Hollywood section
of Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles)
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Article Extras
Updated: February 26, 2012 10:30PM
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Meryl Streep won the Academy Award for best actress for her role in “The Iron Lady.”
Jean Dujardin has earned the best-actor Academy
Award for “The Artist,” becoming the only performer to win an Oscar for a
silent-film role since the first year of the awards 83 years ago.
Dujardin became the first Frenchman to win an
acting Oscar. French actresses have won before, including Marion
Cotillard and Juliette Binoche.
The film’s creator, Michel Hazanavicius, won the
directing Oscar. Claiming Hollywood’s top-filmmaking honor Sunday
completes Hazanavicius’ sudden rise from popular movie-maker back home
in France to internationally celebrated director.
The supporting-actor prize Sunday went to
“Beginners” co-star Christopher Plummer, who became the oldest acting
winner ever at 82. Veteran bit player Octavia Spencer earned the
supporting-actress prize for her breakout role in “The Help.”
Hazanavicius had come in as the favorite after
winning at the Directors Guild of America Awards, whose recipient almost
always goes on to claim the Oscar.
But his win remained uncertain given the lineup of
established filmmakers he was up against: past winners and nominees
Martin Scorsese, Woody Allen, Terrence Malick and Alexander Payne.
When Plummer accepted his best supporting actor award, he stared at the statuette before remarking on how great it looked.
“You’re only two years older than me darling, where have you been all of my life?” Plummer asked.
At birth, he joked, “I was already rehearsing my
academy acceptance speech, but it was so long ago mercifully for you
I’ve forgotten it.”
The humor and heartfelt one he delivered Sunday
night wasn’t that original version, he said, but, “I haven’t forgotten
who to thank.”
Plummer has enjoyed a vibrant career that has
included his first two Oscar nominations in the past three years.
Wearing a navy velvet tuxedo, Plummer thanked fellow nominees, co-stars
and his wife, who he said “deserves the Nobel Peace Prize for coming to
my rescue every day of my life.”
Plummer won for his role in “Beginners” as Hal
Fields, a museum director who becomes openly gay after his wife of 44
years dies. His loving, final relationship becomes an inspiration for
his son, who struggles with his father’s death and how to find intimacy
in a new relationship.
Over more than 50 years in the industry, Plummer
has enjoyed varied roles ranging from Captain Von Trapp in the “The
Sound of Music” to the voice of the villain in 2009’s “Up.” He was
nominated for his portrayal of Leo Tolstoy in “The Last Station” three
years ago.
Plummer beat out fellow nominees Kenneth Branagh, Jonah Hill, Nick Nolte and fellow octogenarian Max von Sydow.
He displaces George Burns, who in 1976 was the
oldest nominee to win a supporting actor Oscar at age 80. Jessica Tandy,
who won for “Driving Miss Daisy” was the oldest winner before Sunday’s
show.
Plummer’s age was a joke for host Billy Crystal,
who told the audience, “He may be walking up on stage tonight because
apparently he wanders off.”
In the end, Plummer did end up onstage and it
wasn’t a mistake at all. The audience showered him with applause and
Plummer’s lifelong dream was fulfilled.
Spencer’s Oscar triumph came for her role as a
headstrong black maid whose willful ways continually land her in trouble
with white employers in 1960s Mississippi.
Spencer wept throughout her breathless speech, in
which she apologized, between laughing and crying, for running a bit
long on her time limit.
“Thank you, academy, for putting me with the
hottest guy in the room,” Spencer said, referring to last year’s
supporting-actor winner Christian Bale, who presented her Oscar.
Her brash character holds a personal connection:
“The Help” author Kathryn Stockett based some of the woman’s traits on
Spencer, whom she met through childhood pal Tate Taylor, the director of
the film.
Before taking the stage, Spencer got kisses from
“The Help” co-stars Viola Davis, a best-actress nominee, and Jessica
Chastain, a fellow supporting nominee.
“I share this with everybody,” Spencer said.
Martin Scorsese’s Paris adventure “Hugo” won the
first two prizes of the night, claiming the Oscars for cinematography
and art direction.
It was a great start for Scorsese’s film, which led contenders with 11 nominations.
“Marty, you’re a genius as usual,” said “Hugo”
cinematographer Robert Richardson, who won his third Oscar after
previous wins for “JFK” and Scorsese’s “The Aviator.”
The wins for “Hugo” were a blow to best-picture
favorite “The Artist,” which lost in both categories. “The Artist,”
which ran second to “Hugo” with 10 nominations, did win the night’s
third Oscar, for costume design.
The Oscars normally start with a major prize such
as one of the supporting-acting categories, but this one began with an
unusual flurry of technical awards. Meryl Streep’s Margaret Thatcher
drama “The Iron Lady” claimed the makeup Oscar.
“Thanks, Meryl, for keeping me employed for the
last 37 years. Your brilliance makes my work look good, no matter what,”
said J. Roy Helland, who shared the makeup Oscar with Mark Coulier.
Oscar organizers saved the first acting trophy
until nearly a quarter of the way through the 24 awards. But TV viewers
had a consolation prize at the outset with the return of beloved Oscar
host Billy Crystal.
Crystal got the show off to a lively start with a
star-laden montage in which he hangs out with Justin Bieber and gets a
nice wet kiss from George Clooney.
Back as Oscar host for the first time in eight
years, Crystal also did his signature introduction of the best-picture
nominees with a goofy song.
Before his monologue, Crystal appeared in a
collection of clips inserting him in scenes from key nominees. The
montage included re-creations from some 2011 films featuring Tom Cruise
of “Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol” and Clooney’s best-picture
contender “The Descendants,” with the actor planting a kiss on Crystal.
Spoofing a scene from nominee “Midnight in Paris,”
Bieber told Crystal he was there to bring in the 18-to-24-year-old
demographic for the 63-year-old host.
Stars such as Clooney, Brad Pitt, Meryl Streep and
Jean Dujardin arrived on the red carpet to the delight of fans in the
bleachers outside the theater, but comedian Sacha Baron Cohen showed up
and upset the chic Hollywood tone.
Cohen arrived dressed in an over-the-top white
military uniform, sunglasses and a thick beard to promote his upcoming
film “The Dictator.” Holding an urn he jokingly claimed were the ashes
of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il, Cohen then dumped the container
onto “American Idol” host Ryan Seacrest.
Among key nominees, Dujardin has a chance to become
the first Frenchman to win best actor for “The Artist,” which is
favored to become the only silent movie to take the best-picture prize
since the first Oscar ceremony 83 years ago.
Streep might join the acting three-peat club with a third Academy Award.
Along with Streep, Hollywood’s big night had plenty
of other returning stars, with past Oscar winners and nominees such as
Clooney, Pitt, Glenn Close, Michelle Williams and Nick Nolte in the
running again.
Because of a change in voting rules, the Oscars
feature nine best-picture nominees for the first time, instead of the 10
they had the last two years.
Competing against “The Artist” for the top honor
are Clooney’s family drama “The Descendants”; the Deep South tale “The
Help,” featuring best-actress nominee Davis; and Scorsese’s “Hugo.”
Also in the lineup: the romantic fantasy “Midnight
in Paris,” from writer-director Woody Allen; Pitt’s baseball tale
“Moneyball” and his family saga “The Tree of Life”; the World War I epic
“War Horse,” directed by Steven Spielberg; and Tom Hanks and Sandra
Bullock’s Sept. 11 story “Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close.”
Spencer had been a virtual lock for supporting
actress, having dominated earlier film honors for her breakout role in
“The Help” as a brash maid in 1960s Mississippi. The same holds true for
Plummer, the front-runner for supporting actor for his role as an
elderly widower who comes out as gay in “Beginners.”
The lead-acting categories are where the drama
lies. Best actress shapes up as a two-woman race between Davis as a
courageous maid leading an effort to reveal the hardships of black
housekeepers’ lives in “The Help” and Streep as British Prime Minister
Margaret Thatcher in “The Iron Lady.”
The record-holder with 17 acting nominations,
Streep has won twice and would become only the fifth performer to
receive three Oscars. Jack Nicholson, Ingrid Bergman and Walter Brennan
all earned three, while Katharine Hepburn won four.
It’s been almost three decades since Streep last
received an Oscar, for 1982’s “Sophie’s Choice.” Though she has the most
acting nominations, she also has the most losses — 14. Another loss
would be her 13th in a row.
Best actor also looks like a two-person contest
between Clooney as the distressed patriarch of a Hawaiian clan in “The
Descendants” and Dujardin as a silent-era superstar whose career tanks
as talking pictures take over in “The Artist.”
It would be the second Oscar for Clooney, who won
the supporting-actor prize for 2005’s “Syriana.” While French actresses
have won before, among them Marion Cotillard and Juliette Binoche,
Dujardin would be the first actor from France to receive an Oscar.
Dujardin was picked as best actor Saturday at the
Spirit Awards honoring independent film, where “The Artist” ruled with
four prizes, including best picture and director for Michel
Hazanavicius, who is favored for the same trophy at the Oscars.
“The Artist” has dominated Hollywood honors this
season, winning key prizes at the Golden Globes and awards shows held by
the Directors, Producers and Screen Actors guilds.
“This means a lot, because it’s a small movie. It’s
not expensive. We did it with small money,” Hazanavicius said backstage
at the Spirit Awards. “And it’s black and white and silent.”
If “The Artist” comes away with the best-picture
trophy, it would be the first win for a silent film since the war story
“Wings” was named outstanding picture at the inaugural Oscars in 1929.
Copyright 2012 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or 
I think that she delivered the best acceptance speech of all time. So warm, so full of heart and saying all the right things. There were tears in so many people's eyes. She must be a great actress because she's such a beautiful person.
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