As far as winning an award goes, tonight was not Glenn Close's night at the Academy Awards. She was up for Best Supporting Actress thanks to her fantastic turn in Ron Howard's Hillbilly Elegy, but unfortunately in losing she tied the record for being nominated the most times without having taken home a trophy. Anyone else in that situation might feel super depressed and not want to engage with anybody the rest of the evening... but Glenn Close has proven that she is no ordinary person. She proved this later in the show during a very out-of-left-field trivia segment hosted by Lil Rel Howery when she magically summed some awesome movie/music knowledge by identifying and dancing to "Da Butt" from Spike Lee's 1988 movie School Daze.
The segment started out a bit odd, with Lil Rel Howery first going to Andra Day and Daniel Kaluuya as "volunteers" in the segment, but it was when he moved over to talk to Glenn Close that the magic really began and solidified what turned out to be the best moment of the night, You can check out the clip from the Academy Awards broadcast below!
While tonight's strange broadcast surely inspired plenty of people to put some odd things on their Oscar Bingo cards, there is not a chance in hell that a single person in the world could have predicted a moment when Glenn Close would reach deep into her memory palace and come up with deep details about a go-go funk song that was not in fact nominated for an Academy Award. Naturally it was a bit that hit the internet like a lightning strike, inspiring all kinds of great reactions on social media.
Responding to the fantastic surprise Oscar moment, Spontaneous director Brian Duffield commented that the way in which Glenn Close managed to salvage the entire bit was basically a microcosm of her time in Hollywood and her filmography. He wrote,
Matthew A. Cherry, who is an Oscar-winner in his own right thanks to the brilliant animated short film Hair Love, also commented on the moment, saying that while she may have lost the prize for Best Supporting Actress, Glenn Close deserves a special prize for her impressive display of knowledge:
Entertainment Weekly reporter Joey Nolfi took Matthew A. Cherry's comment one step further. Rather than just flatly suggesting that Glenn Close should get an Academy Award for the moment, he went a step further and advocated it for being considered as a nominee (and predestined winner) for next year's Best Live-Action Short category.
The Hollywood Reporter editor Rebecca Keegan also added her two cents to the mix with a direct comparison between perennial also-ran Glenn Close and Meryl Streep. The latter may have three Oscar statues to show for her 21 nominations going back to 1979, but the former has the capacity to amaze us with her deep School Daze knowledge and willingness to get up and dance on a live-broadcast:
Finally we have comedian Billy Eichner, who kept his response simple, using three words and three emojis, but I think you'll agree that his point is made:
Tonight's Academy Awards could definitely be called a mixed bag – especially because of that car crash of an ending that left everybody confused – but Glenn Close made the whole broadcast worth it. All that being said, we're also definitely keeping our fingers crossed that it doesn't go down in history as her greatest Oscars moment, as hopefully within the next few years her name will be called to the stage and the industry will be able to properly celebrate her remarkable career.
