Never Ever Nominated 3

 Hollywood Prom Night will be here Sunday, March 12th. That's when the Oscars get handed out. Jimmy Kimmel will host again. Again, folks will complain the following day about the awards show's length. The Academy should have Oprah host the telecast one year. Hollywood knows her. She was an Oscar nominee herself (for THE COLOR PURPLE) and, as one who was a celebrated daytime TV host, she knows how to move a show along. She could shorten the Academy Awards telecast just by proclaiming "YOU get an Oscar! YOU get an Oscar! YOU get an Oscar! Everybody gets an Oscar!"

For the entire month of March, cable's TCM (Turner Classic Movies) airs movies that won or, at least, got nominated for Oscars. I pitched the channel devote a few nights to performers who were never ever nominated. In my previous posts, I mentioned the never-nominated Edward G. Robinson, Myrna Loy, Joel McCrea,  Dana Andrews, Anton Walbrook, Mia Farrow and Donald Sutherland -- among others. Here's a final installment -- NEVER EVER NOMINATED 3.

Jack Carson was one of Old Hollywood's most dependable and versatile actors. He could be a tough in a western such as DESTRY RIDES AGAIN, a wise Washington DC political reporter in MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON, a real heel as in MILDRED PIERCE or the lovable leading man to Doris Day in the musicals ROMANCE ON THE HIGH SEAS and MY DREAM IS YOURS.

Carson did some very strong work in the 1950s. I would've given him a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination for playing the cynical Hollywood studio publicist in George Cukor's 1954 remake of A STAR IS BORN. He was also strong as "Gooper," the married corporate lawyer jealous of his constantly drinking, emotionally distant brother in CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF.

Jeff Daniels. His film credits in RAGTIME, TERMS OF ENDEARMENT, SOMETHING WILD, PLEASANTVILLE, THE SQUID AND THE WHALE, GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK, THE HOURS, INFAMOUS and, yes...DUMB AND DUMBER. Daniels was excellent in all those films and in Woody Allen's comedy/drama fantasy THE PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO. In that, he plays the 1930s movie hero who steps off the big screen and into the life of a lonely, heartbroken moviegoer played by Mia Farrow. She's also in the Never Ever Nominated club.

Lloyd Nolan. Millions of us baby boomers knew him as the kindly doctor who hired a Black single working mother registered nurse on the 1968-1971 TV series, JULIA, starring Diahann Carroll. From the 1930s though the 1950s, he was another of Old Hollywood's most dependable, talented actors. His final performance was as the dad to Mia Farrow's character in Woody Allen's HANNAH AND HER SISTERS (1986). I loved him as the Irish-American cop in Elia Kazan's A TREE GROWS IN BROOKLYN (1945) and as the father of a young married man who becomes a drug addict in 1957's A HATFUL OF RAIN. Also in 1957, his courtroom speech in PEYTON PLACE is one of the highlights of that Oscar-nominated film. Nolan played the compassionate local doctor who knows all the dirty little secrets of that prim New England town.

LINDA DARNELL. Starting at 20th Century Fox in the 1930s, this brunette lovely could play the sweet good girl in films such as DAYTIME WIFE (1939), THE MARK OF ZORRO (1940) and BLOOD AND SAND (1941). Or she could be the bad vamp in FALLEN ANGEL (1945) and FOREVER AMBER (1947). She was at her best as Lora Mae, the girl from the wrong side of the tracks who plans to move up in social class. She'll do that by trapping a bear. The bear is the burly town millionaire who owns the department store where she works. He marries her. When she and her two best friends get word that the town glamour girl has stolen of their husbands, Lora Mae realizes she's more in love with her husband than she thought. The sophisticated comedy is Joseph L.Mankiewicz's A LETTER TO THREE WIVES (1949). Linda Darnell should've been in the Best Supporting Actress Oscar race for this one.

Technically, he was an Oscar nominee. He was up for Best Supporting Actor thanks to his work in the 1957 remake of A FAREWELL TO ARMS. But Vittorio De Sica was never ever nominated for Best Director. De Sica directed the film classics UMBERTO D., TWO WOMEN starring Sophia Loren, MARRIAGE ITALIAN STYLE,  SHOESHINE, THE ROOF, THE GARDEN OF THE FINZI-CONTINIS and the wonderful BICYCLE THIEVES.

So...when people say, "It's an honor just to be nominated," I believe them.