Oscars 2006: the critics’ choice -...

Section:GDN RR PaGe:5 Edition Date:060303 Edition:01 Zone: Sent at 1/3/2006 20:41 cYanmaGentaYellowblack

The Guardian | Friday March 3 2006 5

Tory MetzgerDirectors’ agent“One of the things about Hollywood,” saysVictoria Metzger, “is that agents, produc-ers and studio executives, to some degree,all do the same thing, which is put filmstogether.” And, as anyone who has evertried knows, this assembling of a movie —when directors, producers, writers, actorsand financiers are all stirred together bytheir agents over a script — can be a longand painful process. Perhaps this is whyagents are so unpopular in some circles.

But, though some do not welcome theagents’ influence, most of the films weknow and love would certainly have beenvery different without them. And fewagents are more influential than Metzger,of the Creative Artists Agency in BeverlyHills, founded by Michael Ovitz in 1975and now reputed to be the most powerfulentertainment agency in the world.

Usually known as Tory (“spelled likethe party”), she mostly represents direc-tors such as Ang Lee, Cameron Crowe andSpike Jonze, but has also worked withAkiva Goldsman and James Schamus aswriters, along with Tom Cruise, Gwyn-neth Paltrow and Danny DeVito. I ask howmany Academy awards and nominationsher clients have gathered in her 17 yearsin the business. “Gee . . .” she considers

for a moment. “I probably should havemade a list. But I didn’t.”

This year, Metzger’s focus will be onAng Lee once again, who was up for bestpicture, foreign language film, anddirector in 2001 for Crouching Tiger, Hid-den Dragon, and thanked Metzger whenhe collected his Bafta last month forBrokeback Mountain. How is she feelingabout this year’s awards? “Nervous. I’mknocking on wood,” she says. “I’m not aterribly superstitious person, althoughwhen something appears to be the frontrunner it always pays to keep a healthyattitude, never to count on anything.”

Metzger denies there is such a thing asan “Oscars movie” but finds herselftempted to make an exception for Broke-back Mountain. “There are things that youknow will get other artists’ attention. Butyou probably never speak it, because youdon’t want to jinx it. And you don’t sendsomething to a client and say, ‘This is anAcademy award-winning movie’, you sim-ply send something and you say, ‘This isa good movie’.”

And if she were to win an award for onepiece of work she had done as an agent,what would that be? “You can’t be totallymodest and be an agent,” she concedes.“In fact, nobody in Hollywood who hasachieved a level of success can be a com-pletely modest person — but I’m blushing

at the idea of even answering!” There is asly chuckle. “I’m hoping it’s before me,not behind me. How about that?”

Cynthia SwartzOscar campaign organiserCynthia Swartz is not a film-maker, andyet she has more best picture nominationsto her name than Steven Spielberg (five),Francis Ford Coppola (five), and bothCoen brothers (one) put together. By mycount, since joining Miramax in the early1990s, she has run the Oscar campaignsfor 12 films that went on to receive bestpicture nominations. They were: The Cry-ing Game, The Piano, Pulp Fiction, TheEnglish Patient, Good Will Hunting,Shakespeare in Love, The Hours, Chicago,Gangs of New York, Finding Neverland,The Aviator and now, in her new job at theDart Group, Crash. (She did not work onChocolat, as she was at Sony at the time.)Altogether, during her time at Miramax,the company received more than 150Oscar nominations in all categories.

And yet Swartz sounds surprised that Imight want to talk about her work at all.“The film is the most important factor,”she says, “clearly and always. But themore marketing and publicity awarenessa film has the more people will look at it.”This has been Swartz’s speciality since she

started working at a small agency promoting foreign films in the late 1970s:getting people to take notice of indepen-dent movies, often in ingenious ways.

“I worked on Kieslowski’s Red yearsago, and that was a film I thought couldget nominated for best director,” she says.“There was a bit of a controversy, becauseeveryone thought it would be a foreignlanguage entry, and it wasn’t eligible inthe foreign language category. So weaggressively publicised that, as well as getting the tapes out around the sametime that the publicity was coming out.”This publicity took the form of a PR campaign. “There was a petition that wascirculated to try to get the Academy to reconsider its decision,” Swartz explains.“And you tell journalists what’s going onand they want to write about it.” Sureenough, Red received a best director nomination, as well as two more, for writ-ing and cinematography. It did not win inany category, but to Swartz this is less important. “To be honest, I’m not inter-ested in wins,” she says. “If a film getsnominated, that’s a win, in my opinion.”

This year, Swartz has been behind twocampaigns believed to have succeededagainst the odds: Crash for best picture,and Terrence Howard for best actor. “TheTerrence Howard thing was really excit-ing,” she says, “because it meant a huge

Best film

Will win

PeterBradshaw(Guardian)

Best director

Best actor

Best actress

Best supportingactor

Best supportingactress

Should win Should’ve been a contender

SukhdevSandhu(Telegraph)

DerekMalcolm(Evg Std)

JamesChristopher(Times)

PeterBradshaw

SukhdevSandhu

DerekMalcolm

JamesChristopher

PeterBradshaw

SukhdevSandhu

DerekMalcolm

JamesChristopher

Crash

Ang LeeBrokebackMountain

JoaquinPhoenix Walk the Line

PhilipSeymourHoffmanCapote




Andy SerkisKing Kong

ViggoMortensenA History of Violence

Pierce Brosnan The Matador

Ralph FiennesThe ConstantGardener

DavidStrathairnGood Night,and Good Luck



ReeseWitherspoonWalk the Line







FelicityHuffmanTransamerica

JakeGyllenhaalBrokebackMountain


GeorgeClooney Good Night,and Good Luck


Good Night,and Good Luck

Capote Hidden Howl’s MovingCastle

Hidden The ConstantGardener


FrancesMcDormandNorth Country


Val Kilmer Kiss Kiss Bang Bang

Deep RoyCharlie and the ChocolateFactory

Mickey RourkeSin City

Tom HollanderPride &Prejudice

GeorgeClooneyGood Night,and Good Luck

Paul Giamatti Cinderella Man


MichelleWilliamsBrokebackMountain


Rachel WeiszThe ConstantGardener




Tilda SwintonThe Chroniclesof Narnia

RachelMcAdamsWeddingCrashers

Tilda SwintonThe Chroniclesof Narnia

ThandieNewtonCrash







Bennett Miller Capote

MichaelHanekeHidden

JulietteBinocheHidden

Sibel KekilliHead-On

Naomi WattsKing Kong

NatashaRichardsonAsylum

MichaelHanekeHidden

FernandoMeirelles The ConstantGardener

Stephen ChowKung Fu Hustle

BrokebackMountain

BrokebackMountain

BrokebackMountain

BrokebackMountain

BrokebackMountain

amount for Terrence. He’s a reallywonderful actor who hasn’t been noticedenough, and the role wasn’t a traditionalAcademy role, as it were.”

To some, the nomination of Crash hasbeen an even bigger surprise. “Crash wasgreat,” says Swartz, “although we had areal battle because people didn’t think itwas going to make it. We’ve been talkingthe Crash talk since the summer, and for along time people looked at us like we hadthree heads, but we knew it had a reallygood chance.”

One factor thought to count against itwas how long ago it was released. “ButLions Gate was able to turn that into anadvantage,” she explains, “because itmeant they could go very wide with theirDVDs because there was no piracy issue.”

Swartz is a defender of the Academy,insisting its taste is more wide-rangingand less predictable than people think,although there are distinctions betweendifferent juries. “There are some films thatyou know might not win critics’ awards,”she says, “but you think would have goodluck with the Academy.” Could she givean example? There is a long pause. “Every-thing I’ve ever worked on.”

Live coverage of the 78th AcademyAwards starts at 12.05am on Sundaynight on Sky Movies 1.

Oscars 2006: the critics’ choice

Oscars 2006: the critics’ choice -...

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