[TD 144] The Kodak Theater presents... The 144th Think Different!

[Volante]

Starting a little early (because I didn't want to get completely swamped at work tomorrow), and we're already an hour behind!
So to bring you up to speed, here's how this show will to be run:

(Rules lifted from Turd's TD143, which was lifted from opus's TD132, and then tweaked as necessary)

1. DO NOT POST YOUR ANSWERS IN THIS THREAD! Send them to me by private message.

2. Deadline for submissions is 11:59:59 PM PST on Monday, December 19, 2011.

3. The object, as you know, is to provide the least popular correct answer for each of the questions.

a. Your score on a question equals the number of people (including you) who gave your answer.
b. Incorrect answers receive the "sheep" score (highest score on that question) plus 5
c. Lowest final score wins (with total computed by adding your scores together)

4. You will be given two friends to help out on questions you have problems with. Each can be used only once.

a. George C. Scott - Equal to a drop, he'll show up, say you don't have to give an answer to this question, slap the scorer, then go back to watching his hockey game because Patton.
b. Marlon Brando - Instead of giving an answer, he'll send Sacheen Littlefeather and explain that answering this question harms the Native Americans or whales trapped under the ice, or something. Unfortunately, the more Littlefeathers used for a question the more annoyed the scorer gets, so you will be given points equal to the number of Brandos used for that question.

5. Answers must be provided out of the wealth of information that exists in your brain. No research! However, if, in the course of your normal activities (like Friday's Jeopardy...), you happen to learn something useful between the time you read the questions and the time you submit your answers, that new knowledge is fair game.

6. Only awards and nominations that have, as of today, December 11, 2001, been doled out count for any question.

7. In the event of a tie...you better hope you get closer on the last question than your competition! If even after that, well, AMPAS has given out awards for ties before, I see no reason why I can't. Basically, don't rush. It might take you a day to get through the questions in the first place!

8. If you have questions or comments, send them to me via private message unless you are sure that what you say will not reveal answers, offer hints, steer players away from negbait, or in any other way affect the outcome.

And with that, on with the show!

[Volante]

1. THE BIG FIVE
Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Original OR Adapted Screenplay. Winning all five of these is considered the pinnacle of movie recognition. To date, only three films have accomplished this. That, however, would make for a very poor TD clue! Instead...
Name a movie that was nominated for the Big Five; whether it won any or not doesn't matter


2. ART IMITATING LIFE
Tropic Thunder taught us, to win an acting Oscar, you don't go full retard. While it's true that characters with mental handicaps fall under the category 'Oscar Bait' very well, there's a subclass that gets even more recognition: real life people. I was originally planning to ask for anyone who's been nominated for playing a real person...then I saw the list. So, for this question...
Name a Best Actor or Best Actress winner who won for playing a real, factual person (living or dead).
Bonus! For one point off, name who they played to win. For an 800 on the SAT Essay section, in three pages describe how the thespian made a mockery of history.


3. THE IRON LADY
There are two types of roles for actresses in Hollywood: the ones Meryl Streep gets, and the ones casting wants Meryl Streep to take. (You really think they wanted Jennifer Lopez in Gigli?) To date, Ms. Streep has racked up a record 16 Oscar nominations, (a not-close-to-a-record 2 wins,) and a career solidly entering it's fourth decade.
Name either a character Streep played that resulted in a nomination OR the movie that character was in.
Be More Specific is in play here. Your answer must be distinguishable as character or film title without a parenthetical otherwise I may misfile your responce.


4. SUBTITLED FOR YOUR PROTECTION
The Best Foreign Language Film Oscar is a curious beast. The film must be produced outside the USA and the dialogue must be predominantly non-English. A requirement that lasted up to 2006 was that the language had to be official to the country as well. Confused yet? Or are you still wondering why the entirety of a nation's film output rests solely on the shoulders of one single movie?
Name a country that has won for Best Foreign Language Film
Trivia! The United Kingdom has been nominated twice for this category. Both films were in Welsh.


5. THOSE WHO ARE ABOUT TO DIE, WE SALUTE YOU
Ahh, the Honorary Oscar. The "You did such a good job throughout your career and we're sorry we kept ignoring you" award. It didn't start out that way, though. The first Honorary Oscar went to Warner Bros., for The Jazz Singer. The second, to Charlie Chaplin, so he wouldn't get four for The Circus (writing, acting, directing and producing...should have made it twice the size at least!). Chaplin would, eventually, get a competitive Oscar (Best Score, Limelight). This is for those who didn't even get that lucky.
Name a recipient of an Honorary Oscar who was nominated for, but never won, any competitive Oscar.


6. LIKE SOME CHEESES, SOME MOVIES DO NOT AGE WELL
Quick! Think of your 10 favorite movies. If you're like most people, 10 of those will not be a Best Picture winner. It's a favorite party game to complain how AMPAS can't pick films that stand the test of time, and in the coming months, expect to see the inevitable "Top 10 biggest Best Picture blunders" lists. Well, it's now your chance to get a head start on them!
Name a Best Picture nominee with a higher IMDb rating than the movie it lost to.


7. TO THE VICTOR GOES...NOTHING!
You might not realize it, but in the past 29 years, only 10 of the Best Picture winners failed to pull in over $100 million at the box office. (Is it due, in part, to the Oscars now being used as a high profile advertisement for Fall releases? Perish the thought! Actually, don't. It's actually a pretty decent theory.)
Name a Best Picture winner, 1982-present, that failed to break the $100 million mark


8. THE DREADED MUSIC QUESTION
It's simple! I give you a list of Best Original Song winners. Pick one and give the movie it was in.

a. (I've Had) The Time of My Life
b. Into the West
c. It's Hard out Here for a Pimp
d. Lose Yourself
e. The Morning After
f. Moon River
g. Que Sera Sera
h. Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head
i. Sooner or Later (I Always Get My Man)
j. Streets of Philadelphia
k. Take My Breath Away
l. Talk to the Animals

Bonus! For one point off, include a composer or lyricist who received an award for the song in question.


9. I KNEW IT WAS YOU
John Cazale. Major roles in five pictures, appearing in only six throughout his life. His best showing at an awards ceremony? Nominated for a Golden Globe. What makes this man so memorable? All six of the films he was in went on to be nominated for Best Picture. Three went on to win. Quite the record.
Name a film featuring John Cazale.
Trivia Bonus! During filming of his final film, the studio behind it found he was dying of cancer. His actress girlfriend at the time stuck by his side and said if he goes, so does she. The studio relented, and Cazale made it through filming. For one point off, name this actress.


10. EGOT
A pinnacle for the acting community, showing your diversity not just on film, but on stage, on television and on record. The EGOT crowd has just thirteen elite members, each with an Emmy, a Grammy, a Tony and an Oscar. While some will pick nits as to whether honorary awards count as much, or if the daytime is just as good as primetime, I say, 'Pshaw!' It still involves getting the award committees to recognize you.
Name one of the thirteen EGOT holders.


11. FAMILY MOVIE NIGHT
In the past 83 years, the Best Picture has taken on many dark, bloody and vulgar topics and shown them without looking away. Unfortunately, this can cause a bit of a problem if you have youngsters and want to show them a film that was considered that year's best. Well, this will make picking a film slightly easier...
Name a Best Picture winner that is not R- or X-Rated
Notes: If a film was re-rated and remained uncut, the lower rating will count. If a film had to be re-cut to get a lower rating, only the version that won the Oscar counts.
Trivia! Yes, there actually was an X-Rated Best Picture winner: Midnight Cowboy. It would only rate R today, I'm sure.


12. THERE'S AN AWARD FOR THAT
There's more awards at the Oscars than just the acting, the directing and the producing. No one asks about them, but they tend to make or break your over/under at the office pool.
Name one of the thirteen Oscar categories that have NOT been explicitly named in this TD.
My original plan was to make each clue themed off one award. Long story short, you know who Wally Pfister is? That's why I didn't.


13. HOLLYWOOD ROYALTY
Much like in politics or business, Hollywood has their Kennedys, their Windsors, their Hapsburgs, their Bushes. Children, spouses, they all find a way to get in the biz, and some aren't just successful, they win awards. Maybe talent is genetic...
Name two Oscar winners who are related in three degrees of seperation or less on the family tree.

Ok, this is going to be a long caveat section, but I really wanted to keep this one in, because if nothing else, J! asks questions like this all the time.

- Examples of seperation: Parent to child is ONE degree. Parent to grandchild is TWO. Parent to spouse of grandchild is THREE.
- Marriage counts as perpetual for this question. A divorce will not break the chain.
- If an award is shared, it still counts as having won the award.

- Each name provided will be tallied individually, not as a pair.
- The total score you receive will be the sum of how unique your two names are, divided by 2.
- Only correct pairs will be tallied. Incorrect pairs (even if one name is possibly accurate) will be marked wrong.
- A wrong score will be given as the sum of the two least unique names, divided by 2, plus 5.
- You would be correct in assuming that I had tossed out more complex ways of scoring this.


14. BONUS - IN MEMORIUM
Every year, we lose the genius of past times and generations, and every year we remember them through a two second appearance in a montage that's drowned out by someone either singing or dragging a cat through a chalkboard factory. Then we go to the internet and wonder and rant about why someone wasn't included in that clearly solemn event. (Yeah...I'm still griping over last year's...)
Name an Oscar nominee who passed away between December 11, 2010 and now.

- Scoring is slightly different. This is another question I couldn't bear to part with, but as I was thinking about it, I realized, I couldn't come up with anything to answer with. So it's a purely bonus question:
- Correct answers are scored in reverse. Sheeps get (-1) added to their score. Singletons get (-sheep) added.
- The technical forumla is -(1 + Sheep - Your Score).
- Wrong answers get 5 added, however...
- There is no penalty for skipping this question.


15. ICEBREAKER TIE BREAKER
As I can hear the orchestra trying to play me off for the sixth time, there's one last question to give out: the tie breaker.
The Oscar ceremony is consistantly one of the highest rated shows on TV, but it has been slipping of late. Whether AMPAS agrees or not, it seems the more popular the movies are in the running for Best Picture, the higher the number of viewers. The high water mark of viewers, logically, was the 70th Academy Awards, where Titanic and James Cameron sailed off with the gold.
To four significant digits, how many viewers (in millions), did the 70th Academy Awards telecast have?

[Volante]

Players
Turd Ferguson
MarkBarrett
WRV
Woppy T
Peggles

oddsox
Vanya
opusthepenguin
gamawire
ayeembored

econgator
Rackme32
Bamaman
seaborgium
Paucle

barandall800
mitchparov
goforthetie
debramc
teapot37

amorris525
fowlerism
RandyG
xxaaxx
billy pilgrim

Woof
bomtr
cheezguyty

[Volante]

Clarifications
My creative method of phoning a friend might result in complications that were unforeseen at the time of creation.
Make sure to be clear in your answer if you're calling for assistance or if you're intending to use the refusers as your response; for example, "Calling *name*" where appropriate.
Also make sure to mention if you're deciding not to use one or both; as there's no benefit to not using one, I often can't tell if it's a tactical decision or a misinterpreting.

Except where explicitly mentioned (i.e., Question 5), an Oscar Winner refers to someone who's won a competitive award. Not an honorary.

QUESTION 7
The $100 million is referring to the U.S. domestic take, not international.
1982 in the given time span refers to the year the first movie won for. It won in 1983...if that makes it even more confusing...blame AMPAS.

QUESTION 9
You will get credit for the bonus, if you answer it correctly, despite using a lifeline or getting the main question wrong.

QUESTION 12
Errata: originally it asked for one of the 12 unmentioned awards, I miscounted. There's actually 13 15 unmentioned. (Would've been smarter of me if I went off a bulleted list instead of counting them up in the World Almanac...)

QUESTION 14
You can freely drop this question without using either of your two lifelines. Only a wrong answer will penalize you; better to be clam if you're not confident.

QUESTION 15
This question only comes into play if after the prior 14 questions you're tied with someone. Using a lifeline here will do no good as there are no points involved. At worst, just pick four numbers at random. (Perhaps what you used for Jupiter? )

[dhkendall]

To date, Ms. Streep has racked up a record 16 Oscar nominations, (a not-close-to-a-record 2 wins,)

Ah, the Susan Lucci of the Oscars, I presume?

Trivia! Yes, there actually was an X-Rated Best Picture winner: Midnight Cowboy. It would only rate R today, I'm sure.

Midnight Cowgirl is a different story ...

I'm debating whether to enter this. As many people here know, I do not do well on anything related to Tinseltown. On the other hand, I rarely miss a TD and hey, entering could help me learn (although I do learn from the Guesstimanias, though from the sidelines). If I enter, will y'all promise not to laugh at my answers? At least I have no problems with coming in last (I have a reserved parking spot there at Think Different headquarters anyways.)

[jeff6286]

Wow, you weren't kidding about it taking a day just to read through the questions. Not that this is a bad thing, of course. I do see one item that may need clarification. In question 7, about movies that failed to earn $100 million at the box office, is that domestic gross or worldwide? I'm guessing that there are probably at least a few films that would fall on the other side of that line if international earnings are considered.

[Volante]

Wow, you weren't kidding about it taking a day just to read through the questions. Not that this is a bad thing, of course. I do see one item that may need clarification. In question 7, about movies that failed to earn $100 million at the box office, is that domestic gross or worldwide? I'm guessing that there are probably at least a few films that would fall on the other side of that line if international earnings are considered.

Yep, it is for domestic. (Likely only one of those 10 would still qualify if that was taken into account )

[econgator]

At least I have no problems with coming in last (I have a reserved parking spot there at Think Different headquarters anyways.)

I can't even answer Q1, so I doubt you'll be bringing up the rear.

[MarkBarrett]

I copied the Qs but not the names of the helps. PATTON is my George C. Scott drop. BRANDO is my Marlon Brando help.

[econgator]

6. LIKE SOME CHEESES, SOME MOVIES DO NOT AGE WELL
Quick! Think of your 10 favorite movies. If you're like most people, 10 of those will not be a Best Picture winner.

Interesting. I thought about this and actually 7 (and it really should be 8) of my 10 favorites are Best Picture winners.

[Volante]

6. LIKE SOME CHEESES, SOME MOVIES DO NOT AGE WELL
Quick! Think of your 10 favorite movies. If you're like most people, 10 of those will not be a Best Picture winner.

Interesting. I thought about this and actually 7 (and it really should be 8) of my 10 favorites are Best Picture winners.

Well, clearly, you're not like most people!

(Or maybe I was just making a little slight at the Academy...who can say?)

[RandyG]

11. FAMILY MOVIE NIGHT
In the past 83 years, the Best Picture has taken on many dark, bloody and vulgar topics and shown them without looking away. Unfortunately, this can cause a bit of a problem if you have youngsters and want to show them a film that was considered that year's best. Well, this will make picking a film slightly easier...
Name a Best Picture winner that is not R- or X-Rated

Just to be clear, this excludes pics that never received an official rating.... correct?

Quite a beefy quiz. I'll surely be in. And it pretty much doesn't overlap at all with the Classic Movies II TD that I've been sitting on.

[Mambo Queen]

Just found this board again--I'm psyched to play this. Love Oscar trivia!

[opusthepenguin]

I'm debating whether to enter this. As many people here know, I do not do well on anything related to Tinseltown. On the other hand, I rarely miss a TD and hey, entering could help me learn (although I do learn from the Guesstimanias, though from the sidelines). If I enter, will y'all promise not to laugh at my answers? At least I have no problems with coming in last (I have a reserved parking spot there at Think Different headquarters anyways.)

I think TDs are always more fun when more people play. It gives the victors a greater sense of accomplishment. And the losers get the consolation of having company. Judging by your comments, you won't win. But you do have an opportunity to affect the outcome. Imagine your schadenfreude if your lucky guess happens to rob the frontrunner of a singleton. That's a natural high that can last for days, my friend.

Oh, and of course I'm happy to "promise" not to laugh at your answers. I'm sure we all are.

[Bamaman]

I used #2 in my Alabama TD (final scores lost in the grat deluge) but do not remember any of the answers.

[gamawire]

I used #2 in my Alabama TD (final scores lost in the grat deluge) but do not remember any of the answers.

And I used #10 is one of mine, but at least I remember a couple of answers for it!

[ayeembored]

Geez... I'm ready for another bottom of the rankings TD.

I don't care. They're fun, and I at least make sheep sheepier!

[Volante]

Intermission time! Popcorn and soda available at concessions.

And in honor of the halfway point, here's a little extra for everyone: one of my rejected questions and WAY too much detail on why it got the axe:

XX. YOU MUST REMEMBER THIS...
Oscar is a popular subject to reference and parody. Weird Al rescues one in UHF. Tropic Thunder closes with the ceremony. But sometimes special moments from the ceremony itself get a life of their own and become part of the culture itself and they get parodied and referenced.
Name an iconic moment during an Academy Awards ceremony.

As you can probably guess, I decided the overhead would be just too insane. First, how would I draw the line? I could limit it to acceptance speeches, but that would have eliminated a big one. And what makes a moment 'iconic'? Obviously if you remembered it, it MUST have been iconic. Second, I'd have to verify and sort responses. Could I accept just a name or require a short description of the moment? Would a host bit count?

In the end, too many unknowns as well as a pretty good selection of existing clues resulted in the easy decision to omit this one.

Selected acceptable responses:

Spoiler: show

David Niven getting streaked before announcing Best Picture, 1974.
Sally Field's "You like me" acceptance speech
Cuba Gooding Jr. refusing to get played off
Roberto Benigni climing over the chairs to get to the stage
"Oprah, Uma. Uma, Oprah."

[RandyG]

Intermission time! Popcorn and soda available at concessions.

And in honor of the halfway point, here's a little extra for everyone: one of my rejected questions and WAY too much detail on why it got the axe:

XX. YOU MUST REMEMBER THIS...
Oscar is a popular subject to reference and parody. Weird Al rescues one in UHF. Tropic Thunder closes with the ceremony. But sometimes special moments from the ceremony itself get a life of their own and become part of the culture itself and they get parodied and referenced.
Name an iconic moment during an Academy Awards ceremony.

As you can probably guess, I decided the overhead would be just too insane. First, how would I draw the line? I could limit it to acceptance speeches, but that would have eliminated a big one. And what makes a moment 'iconic'? Obviously if you remembered it, it MUST have been iconic. Second, I'd have to verify and sort responses. Could I accept just a name or require a short description of the moment? Would a host bit count?

In the end, too many unknowns as well as a pretty good selection of existing clues resulted in the easy decision to omit this one.

Selected acceptable responses:

Spoiler: show

David Niven getting streaked before announcing Best Picture, 1974.
Sally Field's "You like me" acceptance speech
Cuba Gooding Jr. refusing to get played off
Roberto Benigni climing over the chairs to get to the stage
"Oprah, Uma. Uma, Oprah."

That would be a fun question. One way to get around the difficulties posed is for you to select the iconic moments yourself (10-12 or so) and describe them in a concise, meaningful way, and then ask: "Name the person described in one of the following iconic Oscar moments."

Spoiler: show

He was about to announce the Best Picture winner in 1974 when a streaker ran across the stage.

If you feel that most, or all, of the answers would then be too easy, include some moments that aren't as well-remembered, but still notable.

Spoiler: show

His acting performance and subsequent Oscar win at the 1954 ceremony launched a comeback from a flagging show business career.

[Volante]

...

That would be a fun question. One way to get around the difficulties posed is for you to select the iconic moments yourself (10-12 or so) and describe them in a concise, meaningful way, and then ask: "Name the person described in one of the following iconic Oscar moments."

...

Well, it's still another question I'd have to run the backend on, and anything that makes my workload easier is gravy in my book.