Mr. Comedy, Billy Crystal, sure understood his audience at the Oscars Sunday night when he welcomed the crowd to the “Chapter 11 Theater” and the “Your Name Here Theater.” Yuk, yuk, yuk. A great American company has lost thousands of jobs and is in bankruptcy — hilarious!
Rarely do we get such an undisguised glimpse of Hollywood’s contempt for the little people and their miserable little-people jobs in flyover country.
Kodak, the Rochester company that last month filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, won relief from what’s left of its 20-year, $70 million deal for naming rights to the theater that hosts the Oscars.
Crystal is such a hack that even the presiding judge in the filing predicted his gags: “Billy Crystal will make some joke about this being the Kodak Theatre and Kodak being in Chapter 11,” Judge Allan L. Gropper said at US Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan on Feb. 15.
Hollywood loathes corporate America, but corporations (as Mitt Romney reminds us) are people: Kodak’s woes mean lost jobs in Rochester — more than 52,000 lost since the 1980s.
On Twitter, Rochester was not amused by Crystal’s gibes. “Wish Billy Crystal would stop making Kodak jokes, it’s not funny to people who live here in Rochester,” said Susan Gemmett. “I love Billy Crystal, but his Kodak jokes are as bad as his career after City Slickers,” said Luke Mayo.
“In my small town opinion Billy Crystal didn’t have to make a joke about Kodak. Respect what they’ve done for film & movie industry!” said Kate Chappell.
Seven of the nine movies nominated for Best Picture this year were shot on Kodak film. In addition to subsidizing the theater, on many occasions over the years, Kodak was a sponsor of the Oscars telecast — meaning that while it thrived (and even, alas, when it didn’t) it helped pay the salaries of people like Billy Crystal.