In her acceptance speech upon winning a Golden Globe last week for starring in “The Substance,” Demi Moore said she had never won an acting award before. Reporters who cover show business ran with that claim in their stories about her without doing a simple check of IMDb, where they would have discovered she has won 23 other awards and been nominated 72 times, going all the way back to “Ghost” in 1991.
So it’s not like Moore has been a loser in the Hollywood fame lottery. Her remark reminded me of the “Mad Men” scene in which Peggy Olson (Elisabeth Moss) complains to Don Draper (Jon Hamm) that he never says thank you for her work, and he responds, “That’s what the money’s for!”
While many of us know what it’s like to have an unappreciative boss, in Moore’s case, she somehow managed to get by with paychecks in the millions of dollars for the movies she made, including “A Few Good Men” and “Indecent Proposal,” which were both big hits. She was paid $12.5 million for “Striptease,” which was not. She also got big settlements from her divorces (Bruce Willis & Ashton Kutcher). Her estimated net worth is $200 million.
None of that is really anyone’s business, but I hate it when super-successful rich people whine about not winning awards. Let’s face it. While Moore’s presence in good movies may have helped sell tickets, nothing she did in her career — including shaving her head for “GI Jane,” for which she was paid $11 million — could be branded brilliant acting that deserved acclaim.
I haven’t seen “The Substance,” but understand there’s a lot of buzz about how Moore’s victory speech at the Golden Globes may help her get an Oscar nomination this week. The same is being said about Pamela Anderson’s performance in “The Last Showgirl,” another film I have yet to see.
Like Moore’s movie, “The Last Showgirl” is considered a comeback vehicle for a middle-aged star who hasn’t been seen on screen for quite a while. The difference is that, unlike Moore, Anderson is really only known for two things: “Baywatch” and the sex tape she made with then-husband Tommy Lee. She’s appeared in a whole lot of movies and TV shows nobody has seen, but if you asked someone to name fifty successful actresses of the last fifty years, Anderson’s name would not come up.
Friends whose opinions I respect say Anderson is very good in “The Last Showgirl,” though her performance doesn’t seem Oscar worthy. The Hollywood press still trips over itself to praise her, and mentioned in every story is how “brave” Anderson is for going out in public — and to the Golden Globes — wearing a minimum of makeup at age 57.
Using “brave” to describe any actress or actor is to misunderstand the word. The women and men fighting wildfires around Los Angeles are the brave ones. The doctors and nurses who saved lives during COVID were brave. Actual lifeguards — not the ones on “Baywatch” — who rescue people from drowning in riptides and monster waves are brave.
A has-been actress going to the supermarket without spending an hour putting on her face isn’t brave. She’s just another woman.