I’ve been a Sacha Baron Cohen fan since, like way before you had even heard of him (*thumbs nose, rides off on fixie, gets scarf caught in spokes, falls and breaks Macbook*), but even I have to admit that from what we’ve seen so far, The Dictator is not his best work. I’ll wait until we see the actual movie, but half-assed jokes about the Kardashians don’t inspire confidence. Now he wants to attend the Oscars as his new character. Which isn’t the same as him screwing with real people who aren’t in on the joke, but is still probably better than Channing Tatum reading kind words about Judy Dench on a teleprompter.
Sources tell The Hollywood Reporter that the actor wants to attend the Academy Awards on Feb. 26 as his character in The Dictator, his latest raunchy comedy set for release by Paramount on May 11. The question is whether the Academy will veto Cohen’s attempt to add a touch of crass spectacle to the regal affair.
Sources say Cohen, who was invited to attend the Oscars as part of the cast of best picture nominee Hugo, has informed Paramount — the studio behind both Hugo and Dictator — of his wishes. Paramount and the Academy declined comment, but an AMPAS source says the show’s producers have not been informed of any Cohen plans.
The 40-year-old British actor, who rose to fame as the creator and star of HBO’s Da Ali G Show, has a history of using awards shows and other big events to hype his movies. To help launch his mockumentary Borat in 2006, Cohen arrived at the Toronto International Film Festival dressed up as his TV journalist alter ego, riding a wagon pulled by “Kazakhstani peasant women.” At the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards, he came as gay fashionista Bruno (to promote Bruno) and was later suspended over the crowd and lowered atop Eminem, who promptly stormed out (it was later revealed the rapper was in on the joke). [THR]
Since when do you have to ask permission for the outfit you’re going to wear? Just do it, man, you’re not going to court. It made more sense to show up in character when he was promoting a documentary-style film. This is just a regular film, so basically he’d just be method acting. And I doubt it will be seem very impressive next to Daniel Day-Lewis fashioning a dugout canoe from an old tree, or Andy Serkis sniffing his own butt and falling off logs.