DAILY DOSE OF HOPE – BLOG – NAIMA LETT
Once in a Lifetime
LENT DAY 9 of 40, © NaimaLett.com/blog
© 85th Academy Awards®
Once in a Lifetime!
It’s Oscar® weekend in the LaLa, and that’s the sentiment most actors feel who’ve made it to the Academy.
As a matter of fact, when Julia Roberts won for Erin Brockovich in 2001, she said just that:
“And sir (music conductor Bill Conti), you’re doing a great job, but you’re so quick with that stick. So why don’t you sit, ’cause I may never be here again!”
It’s A Journey...
… no better yet, a miracle for the 20 actors who make the nominations (5 each in 4 categories) every year. Each performer represents a team of people who meticulously work and plan and labor for years to get them there, following the Hollywood formula and politics to a tee.
Surprise!
But every now and then, there’s a 9-year old Quvenzhané Wallis who wonderfully upsets the system and makes history as the youngest ever Academy Award® Best Actress nominee in her first film role ever in a tiny-budget, non-union film by a first-time director with first-time actors and a first-time crew from Louisiana.
That’s what happened this year, and nobody really knows what will go down on Sunday with the Best Actress in a Leading Role category because the ladies are all relatively newcomers to the ball, literally only in the last couple of years, with the exception of Naomi Watts, whose been in the game for almost 30 years and was nominated for Best Actress 10 years ago. Whatever the outcome, it will be a surprise!
More Than Once?
Once you get into the system though, it seems easier to get repeat nominations, but securing repeat wins – that’s hard.
In the 85 year history of the Academy Awards®:
only 1 actor won the trophy 4 times (Katharine Hepburn),
only 4 others won 3 times (Meryl Streep, Jack Nicholson, Ingrid Bergman, Walter Brennan), and only 33 others have gone to the podium twice including Denzel Washington, Tom Hanks, Robert De Niro, Elizabeth Taylor, Bette Davis, Sally Field, and Jodie Foster…
And that’s out of 840 nominations! See how most feel like it’s once in a lifetime?
Once in a Lifetime
On this Fun Friday, Lent Day 9 of 40, I’d like to encourage you to enjoy Grammy Award-winning artist and pastor Smokie Norful’s song, Once in a Lifetime, released as his testimony last year.
SMOKIE NORFUL, VIDEO © 2012 TreMyles Music EMI Gospel All rights reserved
In some of his lyrics, Smokie says:
(Verse 1) As a little boy I used to dream of the big stage
Couldn’t wait to see my name in lights
I had a dream so big, it made a mountain look small
Couldn’t wait till I had it all…
(Verse 2) I used to think that it was the trophies on my wall
Thought if I won, then I’d have it all
And I couldn’t wait till everybody knew my name
I had my own idea of fame
(Last chorus) Once in a lifetime I’ve found the best thing I know
Once in lifetime there’s no sign of letting go
Once in a lifetime I wouldn’t change a single thing
Once in a lifetime you made my whole world sing
I’ll never look beyond your love again
Because I know what I’ve found is truth
Though I’ve searched in every place to find a thing that makes life complete,
Now I know Lord that’s You…
Powerful, right?
The psalmist David prayed it like this in 2 Samuel 7:18-29, “How great you are, Sovereign Lord! There is no one like you, and there is no God but you,”
As we embark upon Oscar weekend, let’s remember that though trophies are nice, all of them pale in comparison to the God we serve. He’s our once-in-a-lifetime!
Onward and Upward, Fam,
Naima
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