Chicago is Oscar’s kind of town

Apparently, shyster lawyer and showman extraordinaire Billy Flynn, played by Richard Gere in Chicago, was right: ‘Razzle dazzle ’em, and they’ll make you a star.’ This sexy, sleazy jazz riff of a musical made out like a bandit Tuesday morning, snagging 13 Oscar nominationsas many nods as past top-placers All About Eve and Titanic. Most of the lead actors received nominations, including kewpie doll-cum-sex bomb Renée Zellweger for Best Actress, the stunning Catherine Zeta-Jones and the impressive Queen Latifah for Best Supporting Actress and cuckolded hubby John C. Reilly for Best Supporting Actor. Conspicuously missing from the list is the croonin’, tap dancin’ Gere, who had, up until now, fared well with critical honors.

Nipping at Chicago’s heels is the epic Gangs of New York, which grabbed ten nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director for Martin Scorsese and Best Actor for Daniel Day-Lewis. The other major players in this year’s Oscar extravaganza include: the literary estro-fest The Hours, which pulled in nine nominations and won the Golden Globe for Best Drama; The Pianist, a moving, semiautobiographical Holocaust tale brought to you by Roman Polanski; and The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, which is only the second sequel to ever grab a nomination for Best Picture. (The other was 1974’s The Godfather: Part II, which took home the top honors.)

Sparks are sure to fly from the inevitable catfight between the heavyweights nominated for Best Actress. Leading the pack as the favorite is Nicole ‘The Nose’ Kidman, for her startling turn as Virginia Woolf in The Hours. The ladies that pose the biggest threats to Nikki and her little gold man are Julianne Moore, nominated for her role as a ’50’s housewife with a picture perfect life in Far From Heaven (Moore will hear her name twice at this year’s ceremonyonce here and again for her performance in The Hours) and Zellweger as Chicago’s leading merry murderess. Firecracker Salma Hayek earned a nod from left field for her unibrowed star turn as controversial painter Frida Kahlo in Frida. Diane Lane rounds out the category with her performance as an adultress wife in Unfaithful.

Underachiever Meryl Streep was surely beating herself up for only one nomination instead of the two that most were banking on from the all-too-dependable actress. Turning in astonishing performances as a high strung woman-on-the-verge in The Hours and journalist-gone-bad Susan Orlean in the wonderfully bizarre Adaptation, Streep just nabbed a nod for the latter. With her track recordshe has now outdone Katherine Hepburn for the most Oscar nominations, with the Adaptation nod bumping her up to 13it’s no wonder people take her for granted. Meryl Streep turning in another revelatory performancewow. Big whoop.

Not to be outdone by the women, the guys nominated for Best Actor are sure to put up a fight. Veteran Jack Nicholson, who’s already been Oscar’d thrice, pulled in his twelfth nod for his performance in the dramedy About Schmidt. This Hollywood institution will be facing off against Gangs star Daniel Day-Lewis, The Quiet American’s Michael Caine (a winner of two Supporting statuettes, this is his first stab at the Leading category), Adaptation’s double-your-pleasure star Nicholas Cage (as twin screenwriters) and The Pianist’s Adien Brody, who gives a superlative performance as a piano player on the run from the Nazi regime.

True to classic Oscar form, most of the Best Director nominees have a film in the racethe exception being Peter Jackson, the wizard behind The Two Towers. Scorsese-ites are undoubtedly pleased to see their high priest nominated for Best Director, though they hold a long-standing grudge with Oscar voters and their reluctance to hand an award over to Marty.

The competition is sure to heat up in the next few weeks, as the nominees turn up the publicity and their chances at a taste of Oscar victory. Only time will tell who is really Tinseltown’s best of the bestand which film company paid the most to have its flick win the top honors.