In predicting who might be nominated for Worst Actor, first you have to ask: What does the Golden Raspberry look for in its leading men? It’s a question that drives Razzie gurus crazy. Sometimes the winners of the Worst Actor award are megastars like Eddie Murphy, John Travolta, and Adam Sandler. Sometimes the winners barely qualify as actors at all: the Jonas Brothers, George W. Bush, Roberto Benigni.
Occasionally, an actor will dominate an era, as Kevin Costner did the 1990s, a decade in which he was nominated six times (and won three Razzies). But sometimes an actor will leap from obscurity with a performance for the ages, as Tom Green did when he won the Razzie for Freddy Got Fingered in 2001. (He’s still the only Worst Actor winner to accept his award in person at the ceremony.)
Winning an Oscar is the ultimate validation of an actor's work — but it won't pay for private school! So when the bills come due, lately it seems like even the most serious thespians will step over Terrence Malick to get to the nearest green screen (and easy paycheck) to deliver crappy dialogue into a 3-D camera. 2011's bumper crop of sequels, remakes, and general schlock has built swimming pools in the backyards of some of our most revered actors. But at what cost to their dramatic cred? Exactly how much of the shine have they taken off their Academy Awards? And which actor did the most damage this year? With Oscar-winners currently stinking up theaters in Larry Crowne and Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Grantland's department of made-up entertainment-related statistics decided to find out.
It’s June, which means that Hollywood is readying another buffet of crap. Endless superhero sagas, pointless remakes, a third Transformers movie — 2011 just might be the worst summer movie season ever. But a lousy summer for movie-watchers is a great summer for Razzie-watchers, because everyone knows that summer is Razzie season.
The Razzies, of course, are the coveted Golden Raspberry awards, the brainchild of Los Angeles PR man John Wilson, who turned an Oscar-party roast of bad movies into a 30-year cottage industry celebrating the worst Tinseltown has to offer. The Razzies (dis)honor Hollywood the day before the Academy Awards in a ceremony that has even occasionally attracted some star power. (Two years ago Sandra Bullock accepted her Worst Actress Razzie for All About Steve in person, her good sportsmanship aided, no doubt, by the fact that she was a lock to win an Oscar for The Blind Side the next day.)
