Supporting Actress 1981

It can be a struggle to come up with something interesting to say for these little introductions sometimes. Usually I just want to get on to the films. I'll try to be more clever next time. I have seen zero of these films and performances and some of them really intrigue me. I am expecting good things from some of these so hopefully they deliver.

1981 Best Supporting Actress

Maureen Stapleton - Reds

I was wondering if the fact that Reds got four of it's actors nominated actually meant all four were really great or if some got swept up in the voting process along with the film. Stapleton has a somewhat juicy part as she gets to play Emma Goldman, an anarchist woman who caused a lot of problems in her day and was very progressive for her time. So Stapleton got to play a woman who is very confident and self assured and says whatever she wants. She calls out Diane Keaton's character at one point in almost a let the adults talk, child, kinda way. For most of the film Stapleton just pops in when there's a big gathering of the anarchists/communists and is this bullish type of lady who belongs right along side the men. I don't think the performance up until that point is worth a nomination, let alone a win, but her role expands when the film starts to wind down. Goldman was deported to Russia at the time that Keaton was there looking for Beatty. Stapleton's character sees her and then takes her under her wing for a bit and shows some actual human quality and not just cold hearted anarchist. She shows some concern and helps point Keaton in the right direction to track down Beatty. The character is strong, obviously, and Stapleton is able to show that to us perfectly. It's just that Stapleton is more like a famous cameo than bonafide supporting character in the film. I know that Stapleton had been nominated a couple times in the previous few years so maybe this was the Academy's chance to finally reward her in what is frankly a very weak year. If that's the case, fine. Sometimes it's just who is left over to pick for a win. Stapleton isn't bad, just not something you'd expect to win.

Melinda Dillon - Absence of Malice

I like these types of films. The adult drama genre is fine but what I like about it is seeing the old cars and fashions and the Budweiser cans, all of that stuff and mainly from the 80s and 90s. I just like seeing how things were from back when I was young which is why I love watching old Law and Order episodes. Anyway, my weird personal interests aside, this film is mostly alright. It's about a reporter lady (Sally Field) who seems to follow no journalistic protocol or integrity when getting her stories. That all serves the plot but there are lots of reviews and articles online about how Field acts in the film. The main story is writing about an investigation into a possible murder suspect without actually following up on it. That suspect would be Paul Newman. He doesn't like that his name is out there and it's ruining his business. His good friend Dillon enters the picture because she was with him the day/night of whoever was killed's disappearance. The film sets Dillon up as a nervous-y, cigarette smoker who works at a Catholic school. Dillon plays the character as she should with the requisite worry and anxiousness that would go along with the predicament she finds herself in. Dillon talks with Newman who guides her in what to say if anyone comes snooping. Then Dillon goes and has a chat with Field to try and help clear Newman's name. And - spoiler - Dillon confesses that Newman was with her because she was getting an abortion and he was there for support. This is a huge confession and big deal because she's a devout Catholic worried that it will harm the school she works at reputation and that her father will find out and be upset. Dillon treats this confession exactly as the situation warrants which is with not only courage but with some naivete. She doesn't want the information printed, she just wants it to help Newman. Field of course prints it and then Dillon kills herself. It's a short performance but one that works well within the film and Dillon does a good job of portraying how worried and scared her character is. That's really all we know of her character because her role is so short, though. I wonder if the subject matter of the confession helped get her nominated because I don't see this as being all that memorable even if her confession is strong acting. It's decent enough but certainly not going to win.

Jane Fonda - On Golden Pond

I was apprehensive about this film because I was worried it would be a Hallmark level movie. It obviously has some good acting from its leads which pushes it out of TV movie territory, thankfully. The film is about an older couple, Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn, who live off a lake and their daughter stops by and drops off her fiancée's kid for a month. Their daughter is Jane Fonda and she really doesn't make much of an impression on the film. She shows up with her future hubby and disappears outside to skinny dip and we see that she has animosity with her dad because he wanted a son, I guess? She then leaves and returns at the very end to pick up her stepson and does a back flip off a dock which apparently heals some old wounds with her father. That's legitimately it for Jane. There is no doubt in my mind that she probably campaigned for her dad and was voted in by association because she's a previous winner. Her role is minuscule and leaves no impact on the film at all. If she didn't have her name and wasn't Henry Fonda's daughter, she wouldn't have been nominated at all. I understand that it supposedly mirrors her real life relationship with her Dad, but that doesn't make the acting any better. And that's one of those things about the Academy that really bothers me because there has to be some other woman out there who would be actually deserving to be in this spot. Fonda is a non entity in this category.

Joan Hackett - Only When I Laugh

I really enjoyed this film even though it's a tad overly long. I'll save the getting too into the film criticism for the other reviews of this one and keep this one mostly short. Hackett is very funny in an understated way with her performance. She plays Marsha Mason's friend who is very prim and proper and upper class. She is more concerned with looking good and looking young than anything else. Therein lies the humor in her performance such as when she says she found a grey hair and will kill her husband if it's someone else's hair or kill herself if it's hers. She has a very sardonic sense of humor and Hackett makes it work wonderfully in her performance. Besides the humor there is really only one scene where Hackett gets to stretch her legs and deliver more than just a few biting remarks. After Mason's character relapses and was out all night and was attacked by a man she ends up at Hackett's place where Hackett eventually explodes in a fountain of repressed anger and frustration at being her friend. It's a real, authentic moment in the film and performance. The rest is just one big ball of depression and sunken sadness with which Hackett is adept at showing. While the role might not be very big or showy, Hackett at least does a good job with the little screen time she has to work with and makes it all interesting and watchable.

Elizabeth McGovern - Ragtime

I went into great detail about the film itself when writing about Howard Rollins but to refresh, Ragtime is a film about NYC at the turn of 20th Century and handles a few different stories about the people of the time. McGovern portrays Evelyn Nesbit, a chorus girl and model who was involved with some rich and influential men of the time period. She was married to some millionaire guy who was convinced that another old millionaire guy had defiled his wife when she was young and then shot him in the head. That sparked a big trial and all kinds of notoriety for Nesbit. It's actually a really interesting story in itself that gets rushed through in this film. McGovern is great as Nesbit and I really enjoyed every moment she was on screen. She gave a performance that didn't treat her character like some dumb model or even just a simple gold digger. Sure she was using these older, wealthy men to her own benefit but McGovern shows us that there is more to Nesbit than just being young and pretty. She walks around the streets and observes the lower class people living and talks with them and she wants to sing and dance and be someone. McGovern injects some liveliness into the performance that doesn't overtake her strong headed ways. The most memorable scene is where McGovern is interrupted while having an affair of sorts and argues with some lawyers while completely naked for an extended period of time. It's almost not sexy because of how McGovern turns it into a business like moment of trying to get her money from her promised divorce. I really liked it because it showed how determined Nesbit is without her seeming too much like a whiny baby as she eventually just accepts what's given to her and moves on. It's a strong showing from McGovern to be naked for so long while also giving a great performance to boot. She leaves a mark on the film with her performance which lately has been a tough thing to find in this category so I'm thankful for that. Ragtime might be a little flat given its subject but it's at least worth watching for Rollins and McGovern.


Some years you expect a bad group and a get a great one. Some years you expect good things and get a group that mostly is uninspiring. That is 1981 for me. I was expecting some of the films to be really good and lead to performances that belonged here but this year was really a two horse race and even then one was more interesting to me than the other. Fonda, just ugh. I like her Netflix stuff and some of her other performances but this was just a waste of a nomination. I don't care about how the film was cathartic for her and it mirrored her relationship with Dad, Henry. The performance just wasn't good. Dillon just is too short and while her confession is handled well, that's all the performance really is. I need more than that for a win. Hackett is kinda fun in her role in a film that was a lot better than I thought it would be, but it's still too slight to take. Stapleton is really just a cameo type of performance playing a famous person in her film. I need more than just walking around being brutish for a couple scenes and then one pity taking scene. She's good and I get what the Academy saw in it coupled with her previous couple nominations but it just wasn't for me. McGovern is the one that stood out head and shoulders above everyone else because she forms a fully realized character. She leaves a mark on the film and is memorable in a good way. I just really enjoyed her performance which is hard to say about the rest.

Oscar Winner: Maureen Stapleton - Reds
My Winner:  Elizabeth McGovern - Ragtime
Maureen Stapleton
Joan Hackett
Melinda Dillon
Jane Fonda