ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times

DATE: Friday, March 29, 1996                 TAG: 9603290047
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: EXTRA EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: KATHERINE REED AND MIKE MAYO STAFF WRITERS 

NEXT TIME, LET BABE BE THE OSCAR HOST

For some reason, all we can think to say about this year's Oscar experience is: Thank heavens, it's over.

We've had time to recover from the hangover induced by staying up late watching Hollywood roll around in self-congratulation and expensive, see-through clothing. And now we can calmly congratulate the participants - and the winners - of our "Beat the Critics" contest.

We went 4 for 9 and that's a respectable batting average in anyone's book. But a number of you went 8 for 9, and that's downright amazing.

We'd like to think that our carefully crafted right-wrong ratio shows that while we do have a certain insight into the workings of Hollywood, we remain fiercely independent from the pressures and glamour of the industry itself. It's a delicate balancing act that we maintain here above the fray. Ahem.

A word about the Academy Awards show itself: What???!!! Here we were, enjoying the fabulous rambunctiousness of Stomp - the group that proves it's OK to drum on your desk and not join the band - and the young tap master Savion Glover, when Quincy Jones sees fit to throw in a gratuitous hanky-wringer: Christopher Reeve introducing an obviously thrown-together montage of movies that prove Hollywood occasionally has put anything above profit. And it proved nothing of the kind. Jones was obviously just aiming to up the emotional ante, but it was a really shocking display of tastelessness.

Whoopi was wonderful, most of the time, although we would have liked to have seen Babe host the show. There would have been no lack of sincerity, in such a case.

Congratulations to our winners. Hope to see you again next year, by which time we hope to have developed the self-control and self-respect necessary to forego the actual Oscars show entirely ... and still have the fun of playing the odds.

THEY BEAT THE CRITICS

Cecelia E. Ponce, Blacksburg

Marty Cassady, Blacksburg

Mark Mattox, Lexington

Kanta Nancy Bosniak, Pilot

Ed Cornbleet, Rocky Mount

Mildred Cornbleet, Rocky Mount

Mina Grossman, Roanoke

Kathy L. Freis, Roanoke

Roslyn Garrison, Roanoke

M.W. Sheets, Dublin

Winners will receive their movie passes next week by mail.

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