The New Old Hollywood?

Bette Midler.  Harrison Ford.  Bill Murray.  Jim Carrey. 

It was like a blast from the 80s-90s on the Oscars last night for reasons I couldn’t understand and still don’t.  In fact, it seemed pretty lame, particularly when there are some rather good – and current – actors out there, who seemed to be getting the short shrift, in terms of being celebrated (whether you agree with Bradley Cooper’s “acting” abilities or not). 

Then, a very insightful friend suggested that these elder statesmen represent the new Old Hollywood and, for a moment, it made sense.  After thinking about it a bit more though, I decided to disagree with his hypothesis, in part because “Old Hollywood” isn’t a nice neat way to delineate movie stars of a previous generation from their present day peers at any point along a continuum.  Old Hollywood was – it is – a specific moment in history; the birth of modern-day filmmaking and the studio system, born of cultural and technology shifts that can never be re-created or replicated, at least not in the same momentous way. 

So while Bette and Bill, Harrison and Jim may now represent “old” Hollywood in terms of age and maybe even appeal, they are representatives of an entirely different cultural taxonomy — one that is yet to be named.  Meanwhile, the real “Old Hollywood” label should be preserved and not used as a generic – like  Kleenex, Band-Aid or Xerox –  to sweep up the movie stars of the latest bygone era.