Yesterday in an effort to catch up on my Oscar homework, I sat in the theater for an ass-numbing six and a half hours watching The Wrestler, followed by Frost/Nixon, and ending with The Reader. I've already seen Slumdog and The Visitor, but not Benjamin Button and Milk.
I'm hoping that Mickey Rourke will win Best Actor. He has had some amazing roles in his day and has been unfairly underrated. I met him and his brother Joey when they co-owned a little boutiqueyish candy store in Beverly Hills called Mickey and Joey's (sadly, Joey died of lung cancer in 2004). This was back in 1989 when I was dating a friend of theirs when they were all bad-boy biker types peeling around L.A. in custom Harleys. Mickey had just finished playing Charles Bukowski in Barfly (1987) and I was in awe. He was handsome and charismatic and dangerously badass and a brilliant Method acting weirdo and I was, like all women back then, a little bit smitten. Regardless of his je ne sais quoi, the guy always was a great actor and it's cool to see him back in the saddle. He deserves this win.
About his face . . .
. . . which seems to be the hot topic du jour. Why he looks so ravaged and different is because he was a professional boxer for five or six years back in the 90s, and his face got pummeled. He needed multiple reconstructive surgeries -- five on his nose and one on his cheek -- and consecutive plastic surgeries to correct damage. Yeah he looks different, but give him a break. And he's 56 years old now.
If you don't know too much about Mr. Rourke, The Onion's A.V. Club has a great little Mickey Rourke 101 Primer.
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