Jennifer Lawrence slips, but not on stage. And Celebrities honor Heroes.

First, the easy stuff: Jennifer Lawrence

J Law slipped up and lost the best supporting actress award to Lupita Nyong’o for her work in “Twelve Years a Slave.” This was a “slip up” on J Law’s part since she’s been on a seemingly unstoppable roll for the last year or so. Thankfully, she did not literally slip up ascending the stage to present the best actor award ( Matthew McConaughey won for “Dallas Buyers Club”).

As she walked to the mic, she asked the audience, “Why are you laughing?” She knew people have come to expect a trip, a fall, or a charming slip up whenever she takes the stage. Her sensitivity to people’s reactions–and people’s willingness to tease her–may all be a throwback to her years of being bullied.

Now, the hard stuff: Celebrities honor Heroes

I had my misgivings when the Oscar PR crew announced a while back that the 86th Academy Awards would be a “celebration of movie heroes,” with the intent to honor “big-screen real-life heroes, super heroes, popular heroes and animated heroes, both past and present…” Part of the crew’s justification was that around the globe, people go to the movies to be inspired by the characters they see on the screen. So far so good. But then, the PR crew said that the heroes would also include the filmmakers and actors who take risks and stimulate us with provocative subjects and daring characters. “They are all heroes in the cinematic landscape.”

The first signs of trouble were the answers celebrities gave as they were interviewed on the red carpet entering the theatre before the show. From what I gather from snippets of these interviews, most identified fellow actors–albeit older, more venerated ones–often conflating the actor with the true life heroes they portrayed. It seemed like celebrities stroking other celebs.

While I watched bits of the show live (esp the last half hour), I viewed the bulk of it via DVR from my exercise bike the days following the show. The somewhat puffy, poorly edited homage to real life heroes portrayed by Hollywood (“Gandhi,” “Silkwood,” etc) was OK, but the compilation of animated heroes (“Shrek,” “The Incredibles,” etc.) clips lost me, mostly because I’ve not seen most of the movies with those characters. While I know about the portrayed super heroes (“Superman,” “The Dark Knight”), action heroes (“Seven Samurai,” “Gladiator”), and literary heroes (“To Kill a Mockingbird,” “Grapes of Wrath”), they aren’t truly of this world.

But what struck me most from the overall show–and I’m relying greatly on Oscar observers  Alison Willmore and Drew Zahn here–was the way true-life heroes got lost and the spotlight ended up, time and again, on the Hollywood celebrities themselves. While much of this is due to the assembling of a show designed to worship Hollywood (what other industry lauds itself year after year), it seemed clearer now than ever before that many of the celebs in attendance were totally into themselves.

From the host whose laid-back style didn’t mind wasting our time to celebs who hardly knew their own forebears (e.g., annoyed by that “stranger” Kim Novak) let alone real-world heroes, many displayed appalling self-centeredness. To learn why this has happened and why so many celebs in the audience seemed vacuous, checked their cells and acted out their ennui, I’ll tap into the wisdom of  People  magazine’s former editor  in my next blog.

My latest book, PRIVILEGED KILLERS, is a true story about a half-dozen Dark Triad people in my everyday life - narcissists, manipulators, and psychopaths. Three of 'em murdered people, and one came after my wife and me. Print and e-book versions of this (and CLEFT HEART) available at Amazon and elsewhere online. Also at your local bookstore.