At 97, American director Mel Brooks accepted an honorary Oscar on Tuesday for his entire body of work, more than half a century after winning his only Oscar for the film The producers, in which he ridiculed Hitler.
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During a gala evening, Mel Brooks, who has also denounced racial bigotry in other films like The sheriff is in jail, joked that he was remorseful over the fate of his previous Oscar for Best Original Screenplay.
“I really miss him. I should never have sold it,” he said. “I won’t sell this one, I swear to God,” he said.
AFP
Having become a master of Hollywood comedy cinema by cultivating bad taste in particular, Mel Brooks is one of the few to have won the greatest awards in American entertainment.
He received his honorary Oscar at the Governors Awards, hosted by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which each year honor four beloved industry veterans, many of whom did not receive awards at the regular Oscar ceremonies.
Twice nominated for the Oscars, Angela Bassett, 64, known in particular for her incarnation of Tina Turner in the biopic released in 1993 What’s Love Got to Do With It, and that of Queen Ramonda in the 2022 superhero film Black Panther: Wakanda Foreveralso received an honorary Oscar.
AFP
Eclectic, the actress has also played in action films like The White House fall And Mission Impossible: Fallout, the horror series American Horror Story and she even lent her voice to Michelle Obama in The simpsons.
Noting that she was only the second black actress to win an honorary Oscar, after Cicely Tyson, Angela Bassett paid tribute to other black Hollywood pioneers like Hattie McDaniel, who won an Oscar for Gone with the wind, in 1940.
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It would be another half century before McDaniel would be followed by actress Whoopi Goldberg.
“My wish is that we leave this industry more enriched, forward-thinking and inclusive than we found it,” Angela Bassett said.