Would you vote for Pete Rose for the Football Hall of Fame? I wouldn't. He played baseball.Would you vote for John C. Mather or George F. Smoot for the Nobel Prize for Literature? I wouldn't, but not merely because I had never heard of them before moments ago, when I googled "Nobel Prize for Physics." The answer is "of course not" because these two made their big bang with the big bang theory.
Would you vote for Jennifer Hudson, the very talented Jennifer Hudson, for Best Supporting Actress for Dreamgirls? I'm not sure I would. She has the true leading role in the movie, not really a supporting role.
Jennifer Holliday, who created the role of Effie on Broadway, did not win a Tony for Best Supporting Actress. No she didn't: She was THE Best Actress.
When "best actress" performances are bumped down to the supporting category, it's unfair to actresses in real supporting roles. Like Catherine O'Hara in For Your Consideration.
In musical theater, there are a handful of true "bring down the house" moments such as "And I'm Telling You" in Dreamgirls -- a show-stopper on the level of, if not surpassing, Mama Rose's "Everything's Coming Up Roses" in Gypsy.
Hudson had the best role in Dreamgirls, the leading role.
Nominating Jennifer Hudson for best supporting actress is like nominating Marlon Brandon for best supporting actor in The Godfather. (Brando did win the Best Actor Oscar.)
True supporting roles can be neglected by the Academy because studios put "bigger" performances -- like Hudson's -- in categories where they think they'll win, or where they think they won't anger or compete against Beyonce. How about a new Oscar for Best Cameo or Best Scene, honoring a performance where an actor or actress has only one scene and really nails it. Like Christopher Walken in Pulp Fiction. People still talk about his pocket watch scene. He wasn't even nominated for it. That year, 1994, Martin Landau won for Ed Wood. And wasn't he terrific? He was indeed. But who's still talking about this performance?
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