The Big Night Dad Brought Home an Oscar

In the spring of 1955, I was almost 6. My younger sister, Maria, and I were just beginning our long career in Catholic school and our dad, Edmond O’Brien, was nominated for best supporting actor in “The Barefoot Contessa.” One might say that Catholic school and the nomination made for diversified conversation that year.

The weeks that followed the announcement of the nomination brought with it much excitement. My mom, Puerto Rican actress/dancer Olga San Juan, was busy looking at gown sketches. Aunts, both Puerto Rican and Irish, turned to additional prayer. Around the house, names like Bogart, Ava, and Joe Mankiewicz popped up often, and often with much love and respect. I, on the other hand, relished the energy and pace. Would this happen every year? I only hoped.

But what I recall most was how proud Dad was to be nominated. You would have thought he had already won. Years later, I’d come to respect and appreciate that attitude. When he would try to explain what was going on, he’d say: “Bridge-O. This means that I have been put in the ranks with some of the world’s great actors. This is an honor. Your ol’ man is proud to be an actor. Damn, it’s a great life.”

While I was getting used to a thing called the school uniform, Dad was adjusting to the hyperactivity a time like this brings. What I thought to be the funniest was that he seemed more concerned about what Mom was going to wear on the big night.

My mother was having a tight-fitted gown made especially for the event. In his basso profundo best, Dad would shout through the house: “But how is she suppose to go to the john in that thing?” An odd concern for a nominee to preoccupy himself with, I thought. That was Dad, a strange sense for the practical.

Finally, Oscar night. With much flurry, commotion and giving of directions, family and housekeepers shooed them off to the limo, Dad sweating and hugging all, Mom taking tiny little steps to the car.

The next memory I have was Dad being presented the Oscar. Screams and cheers resounded throughout the living room. Gosh, there’s Dad on TV. He isn’t sweating any more.

That night I went to sleep elated from the rush of happiness in the house. I also wondered how Mom and the gown made it through the night. Suddenly, I was awakened to the loud sounds of partying in the living room. All at once the hallway door burst open and I heard the strong, definite pace of Dad’s walk. Nobody walked like Dad. Nobody had his energy or enthusiasm either. Then I realized, in my almost-6-year-old excitement, that I had wet the bed. Oh no, he was getting closer and bringing an entourage of very happy people with him.

I thought that maybe if I held the blanket closer to my chin, no one would notice my problem. Enter my exuberant Oscar-winning father with the gold statuette in hand. “Bridge, look what Daddy got. Your ol’ man did it.” He bent over and kissed me. I was so happy for him, but I couldn’t wait until he moved over to Maria’s bed. She never wet the bed.

While in my teens, Dad was nominated again in the same category for “Seven Days in May” (1964). He won the Golden Globe that year too, just like he did for “Contessa.”

Maria and I were older and could feel the nerves and emotions more. Brother Brendan was small and just getting his first taste of all this. And Dad was thrilled and honored that the academy had remembered him once more. Oscar night was scheduled for my 16th birthday. Dad kept saying he hoped he could bring me home a special present.

He didn’t win that year, but I do remember him on TV cheering on Peter Ustinov, who did (for “Topkapi”). Mother, on the other hand, looked like a mask of disappointment. We all laughed at home.

It wasn’t too many years after that night that Alzheimer’s Disease made its ugly trip into Dad’s brain. At the time, we all had no idea why he was changing so drastically. Why lines could no longer be recalled easily and why names of beloved crew members were evading him. And above all why he seemed angry at everything.

As a kid I asked Dad: “Do you like being called a character and supporting actor? Wouldn’t you rather be a leading man?” He gazed at me firmly and steadily and said: “No, Bridge-O. ‘Cause it’s me who gets a chance to do the interesting, the different, the funny. It’s from me the audience expects the unusual. I like it that way.”

On May 8, he will be gone three years and once again this spring will bring with it Oscar night. And I will remember how proud Dad was to be an actor, a supporting actor.