Gary Dretzka
Leonard Klady
David Poland
Douglas Pratt
Ray Pride

The Oscar Reactions

List of Nominees | Nominations by the Number | Nominations by Film

Fact Sheets
Best Picture | Foreign Language | Best Director | Best Actor/Best Supporting Actor | Best Actress/Best Supporting Actress

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"Brokeback is going to go all the way, I think. And how could you feel badly about that, being in the company of all these wonderful films this year? They're all passion pieces and all from filmmakers who took real risks. I would have been proud to have been associated with any of those films. If any of them win, I'll be thrilled."
- Paul Haggis, Crash

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"I think I'm the only guy who came out here to work on film and didn't have Oscar dreams. My dream was to just make movies. Then the night of the Golden Globes, all of a sudden I was really vested, I really cared. So I got up at 5:30 to watch the (nominations) and was tossing and turning all night. It was like going to bed before Christmas when you are 10."
- Josh Olsen, History of Violence screenwriter

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"It's going to be a battle of friends up there. We're going to be happy no matter who wins."
- Terrence Howard, Hustle & Flow

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"I was on an actual live radio show doing an interview when the nominations were announced. My reaction is held for the ages on tape. I thought, 'Don't act like an idiot.' My wife called and screamed into the phone -- 'Hey, you got a nomination!' -- on live radio."
- Bobby Moresco, Crash screenwriter

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"The two biggest moments of my life were walking onstage (as an actor) in Tony Kushner's Angels of America on opening night on Broadway. The second was being nominated for a screenplay Oscar along with him."
- Dan Futterman, Capote

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"We haven't had a TV for four years, so I couldn't watch. And we didn't think we should buy one (just for this). We knew someone would call us, and that's what happened. Catherine (Keener) and I traded messages... It's more than any of us deserve."
- Philip Seymour Hoffman, Capote

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"I'm damn near 37 years old, and I'm jumping up and down on the bed like my 10-year-old. I was a wild man."
- Terrence Howard, Hustle & Flow

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"Our palms were very sweaty, we were listening to live radio. The British press has been saying we were a shoo-in. We didn't know either way, although we knew (because of all the conjecture by the press) it would be a bit embarrassing if we weren't."
- Nick Park, Wallace & Gromit: Curse of the Wererabbit

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" 'I'm walkin' on sunshine yeahhhhh!!' … I knew there was a possibility, but I wasn't really expecting it because no one's really heard this song. It hasn't been playing on the radio or anything. I was down at my beach cottage in Malibu cooking a country breakfast because I get homesick for country food when I'm in the city. So I was cooking biscuits and gravy and fryin' up some Jimmy Dean sausage. I had the TV on, but it was just about the actors, so I didn't know I got nominated until my assistant in Nashville called to say congratulations. I started hopping around my kitchen, and I think I burned half my food. No matter how long you been at it, it's always exciting — like falling in love over and over again."
- Dolly Parton on her nomination for Best Song

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"I'm happy because you can put on the DVD box that is nominated for six Academy Awards, and that's a pretty big thing for a seven-and-a-half-million-dollar, black-and-white film. It will help get it out there. And it also means that we'll get another crack to do more films like that. I'm doing a commercial for overseas to pay for my little black-and-white film."
- George Clooney, Good Night, and Good Luck

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"When you grow up without many friends, your friends are movies, so I'm absolutely elated. I was certainly a dork growing up, so this is a total dream. I wanted to make movies all my life."
- Henry-Alex Rubin, co-director of Murderball

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"I just can't believe that people remembered this movie. It premiered in Toronto like a year and a half ago, and I'm not sure anyone even bought it back then. I knew we had made a good movie, but you're never sure whether people are going to find it and remember it."
- Matt Dillon, Crash

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"I'd love to say that I was sound asleep and didn't notice them, but I woke up for them. Nobody does (admit it), but the truth is, I seriously doubt anyone actually slept through it."
- George Clooney, with three nominations

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"I was a little disappointed I didn't win for Best Actor in a Bat Suit With Nipples. But I needed a specific category."
- George Clooney, on receiving his first Oscar nominations

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"They're not so much message movies as movies that are raising questions without the filmmakers giving you all the answers. And, no, I wouldn't say you have any feel-good movies in there."
- Michele Robertson, Oscar Campaign Strategist

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"Long after the Oscars this year, I think we're going have weekly dinners together. We're all planning to all move in together."
- Steven Spielberg, director of Munich, on his fellow nominees.

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"You can't pasteurize the Academy Award, you can't negotiate it. It is the top."
- Felicity Huffman, Transamerica

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"I was completely surprised."
- Reese Witherspoon, Walk the Line

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"The only way I can lose the election," Louisiana Gov. Edwin Edwards notoriously said in 1983, "is if I'm caught in bed with either a dead girl or a live boy." Brokeback Mountain would have to go further to lose this year's Academy Awards race for best picture, since the live boys is what set the movie apart at first and helped position it as the Oscar film to beat."
- Richard Corliss, Time Magazine

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"I'm feeling very euphoric, I have a glass of champagne in front of me. It is the high point of my professional life so far. I say so far because winning it would be even better, but I'll settle for this for now."
- Jeffrey Caine, nominated for adapted screenplay for The Constant Gardener

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"My levels of gratitude will be overflowing all day, so I'll be making a mess as they spill all over wherever I go."
- Bennett Miller, Capote

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"This year's featured films paint a portrait of America that is guaranteed to have the Bush crowd fulminating. This is a land where the frontier is a hotbed of gay love, and where the cities are seething cauldrons of race hate . It is a country where the workplace is a site for sexual harassment, the heroes are pimps and the pioneer spirit is embodied by a pre-operative transsexual."
- Xan Brooks, Guardian UK

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"We didn't make the film for any kind of political movement. We never expected to change people's minds. But if it does affect people's hearts, if perceptions can get altered, that's a good thing."
- Heath Ledger, Brokeback Mountain

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"I'm going to celebrate by flying to Cabo and having a shot of tequila."
- George Clooney, on his three nominations

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“It's fantastic. You never know with these things. It's so unpredictable. You make the film for its own sake really. You don't make the film for this reason. It's just a great bonus.”
- Nick Park (Wallace and Gromit) toasting the nomination with champagne at Heathrow Airport as he waited for a flight to Los Angeles

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"... I'm not certain that there's ever been a film that has a gay romance that's been embraced this way. But on the other hand the film is about a lot more than that. I've said this before, but it's sort of like saying 'Lonesome Dove' is just a story about a cattle drive."
- Diana Ossana, nominated with Larry McMurtry Brokeback Mountain.

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"... I think I'm amazed how people everywhere have had the sensitivity to want to get into the complexity of the issue, the probability of love, the illusion of love, all those things."
- Ang Lee, Brokeback Mountain

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"I'm just really delighted that this little film with big ambitions got the recognition it deserved. The only thing I wish is that some of my fellow cast members could have been recognized too."
- Matt Dillon, best supporting actor nominee for Crash

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"I guess I'll go have a drink. I don't think my year could get much better."
- Paul Giamatti, best supporting actor nominee for Cinderella Man.

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"My eyes are so covered in tears, I couldn't see half the television. I didn't expect to cry. I thought I would be all right."
- Terrence Howard, best actor nominee for Hustle & Flow

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"I am so thrilled to be nominated for something I loved working on every single day. I'm in such good company."
- Judi Dench, best actress nominee for Mrs. Henderson Presents

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"It's just beyond my wildest dreams ever. Especially having five nominations for the picture, it's a dream come true."
- Michael Ohoven, producer of best picture nominee Capote

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"We're sharing the news with a lot of people, including a lot of people in Rwanda. The news is incredibly meaningful because they realize that people care about what happened to them."
- Kimberlee Acquaro, co-director of God Sleeps in Rwanda, nominated for best documentary short.