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February 16, 2009

It's Annual Trash Cuba Gooding Jr. Day

thumbnail icon: It's Annual Trash Cuba Gooding Jr. Day

Every year around this time, someone writes an article about how the Oscar nominees shouldn't be too excited about winning an Academy Award, because one time Cuba Gooding Jr. won an Academy Award, and now look at him. He's the punchline to a joke! A joke that's made every year around this time! When someone writes an article about how the Oscar nominees shouldn't be too excited about winning an Academy Award, because one time...and the circle is unbroken. Hakuna Matata.

This year's article comes from the Agence France Presse.

From Cuba Gooding Jr. to Adrien Brody, Hollywood is littered with stars who have struck Oscars gold only to discover that their celebrity remains ephemeral and does not suddenly guarantee a pick of Hollywood's most sought-after scripts.

"I don't think that winning an Oscar is any kind of guarantee for a future career," said Lew Harris, a consultant for hollywood.com.

Gooding is a prime example. Despite winning a best supporting actor Oscar for "Jerry Maguire" in 1997 at the age of 29, he has failed to score a major hit since then, appearing in such critically panned comedies as "Daddy Day Camp" and "Norbit," roles that earned him nominations for the Golden Rasperries (Razzies), the anti-Oscars.

Poor Cuba Gooding Jr. You know you have it rough when you starred in Snow Dogs and it doesn't even make it into the official citations of your career mistakes (from my You Know You Have it Rough-a-day calendar). Later, the article also makes reference to Marisa Tomei's difficulty in following up her My Cousin Vinnie Oscar win with meaningful roles, and then compares what happened to her to what happened to Cuba Gooding Jr. Because what's important to recognize is that it always comes back to CGJ. Isn't that right, Lew Harris, a consultant for hollywood.com, which is apparently a thing that exists, and for which geniuses consult.

Let's just formalize this. February 16th, Annual Trash Cuba Gooding Jr. Day. Perfect. See you this time next year, which will be when Cuba Gooding Jr. is talked about again.

Posted by Gabe at 4:00 PM in ,
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7 Comments

Helen Hunt has an Oscar and so does Jennifer Hudson and Lou Goesset Jr

Posted by: Owara Jacksohn profile link at 02/16/09 4:22 PM  | Reply
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You know you have it rough when reading a blog entry about Cuba Gooding Jr. is the highlight of your day.

Posted by: RobinRubbermaid at 02/16/09 4:25 PM  | Reply
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I hope Meryl Streep reads this, maybe then she'll stop acting so cocky.

Posted by: Carrie profile link at 02/16/09 5:07 PM  | Reply
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I liked Ship Friends.

Posted by: Dan at 02/16/09 7:53 PM  | Reply
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ok, france, what kind of crack are you on? 'from cuba gooding to ADRIEN BRODY ...' ???? f the w? that's how you open a story? a million monkeys pounding on a million typewriters could not have come up with such nonsense. brody has had a pretty darn great and varied career. the pianist is no snow dogs. darjheeling ltd is no norbit. leave that crack alone, france. au revois.

Posted by: Jeb profile link at 02/16/09 7:59 PM  | Reply
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I don't want to hate on CGJr because he seems like a genuinely nice guy who knows that he fell ass backwards into that Oscar, but... I really want to punch him in his face and knock that big stupid grin off of it.

Posted by: Mcluskyist profile link at 02/17/09 1:35 AM  | Reply
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Whoa, has the article author done any research on Marisa Tomei? Because I would hardly call The Wrestler, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, and In the Bedroom small fry. And at least Adrien Brody has Darjeeling Limited under his belt.

I guess this means Cuba Gooding Jr. really DOES have the worst career.

Posted by: nisf at 02/17/09 1:39 AM  | Reply
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