CALENDAR GOES TO THE OSCARS : Oscar Bits!

Pass The Salt

Guests at the very first Academy Awards ceremony, May 16, 1929, dined on jumbo squab perigeaux, lobster Eugenie, Los Angeles salad, terrapin and fruit supreme at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel’s Blossom Room.

Fallen Eagles

Jeanne Eagles, a nominee for best actress in 1928-29 for “The Letter,” was the first posthumous acting nominee. She died in 1929 from a heroin overdose.

One is Enough

“Grand Hotel” won the best picture honors for 1931-32 but was nominated for no other Oscars.

Dream Candidate

Hal Mohr, who won the cinematography award for 1935’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” was the first and last write-in winner.

Color It No. 1

“Gone With the Wind,” the best picture winner of 1939, was the first all-Technicolor movie to win top honors.

There’s Always Hope

Though Bob Hope has always complained he’s never received an Oscar, the academy has bestowed several honors upon him over the years, including a special silver plaque in 1941; a 1944 special award; an honorary 1952 Oscar; 1959’s Jean Hersholt Humanitarian award and a 1965 honorary award.

A Very Good Year

World War II veteran and double amputee Harold Russell won two Oscars for 1946’s “The Best Years of Our Lives,” receiving best supporting actor for his film debut and a special award for “bringing hope and courage to his fellow veterans.” Russell didn’t make another film until 1980’s “Inside Moves.”

That’s Rich

Federico Fellini’s 1956 classic “La Strada” won the first award for best foreign language film. That same year, the academy also instituted a clause that no one could be nominated for an Oscar if he or she had admitted Communist Party membership and had not renounced that membership, or if he or she had refused to testify before the House Committee on Un-American Activities or had refused to respond to a subpoena from the committee. Ironically, blacklisted screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, under the pen name Robert Rich, won the Oscar that year for best motion picture story for “The Brave One.” Two years later, the clause was dropped.

Cut! Cut!

Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins became the only co-directors to share the honors for best director, winning for 1961’s “West Side Story.”

Better Late...

After receiving two honorary awards, Charlie Chaplin received the 1972 Oscar for original dramatic score for his 1952 film “Limelight.” The film was eligible for the nomination because it didn’t play in Los Angeles until 1972.

Tube Debut

The Oscars were telecast for the first time on March 19, 1953, on NBC from the Pantages in Hollywood and the NBC Century Theater in New York. Ronald Reagan was the announcer in Los Angeles. Even then, the event ran long. NBC pulled the plug after “The Greatest Show on Earth” was named best film. TV audiences didn’t see Cecil B. DeMille receive the Thalberg award.

Butterfield Hate

Elizabeth Taylor received her first Oscar for her performance as a call girl in the 1960 drama, “Butterfield 8.” Supposedly, she hated the film so much that when she saw it in a projection room, she threw her shoes at the screen. She later said she had never watched the film all the way through.

Pajama Game

The see-through, bell-bottom pajamas that Barbra Streisand wore when she accepted her 1968 best actress Oscar for “Funny Girl” were designed by Arnold Scassi. Oscar winner costume designer Edith Head described Streisand’s outfit as “shocking!”

What’s Nude?

The streaker who stopped the 1974 Oscar show during David Niven’s introduction of Elizabeth Taylor was 33-year-old Robert Opal, who used a bogus press pass to get backstage. He later appeared as a comic on the old “Mike Douglas Show” and was found murdered in 1979 in his sex-paraphernalia shop in San Francisco.

Streep Throat

When Cher won her best actress Oscar for 1987’s “Moonstruck,” she told the audience: “I also would like to thank Mary Louise Streep who ... I feel ... so unbelievable that I did my first movie with her and now I was nominated with her....” Cher, though, completely forgot she had made three films before she starred with Streep in 1983’s “Silkwood”--1967’s “Good Times,” 1969’s “Chastity” and 1982’s “Come Back to the 5 & Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean.”

Heeeere’s Kate!

A previous no-show at the Oscars, four-time winner Katharine Hepburn finally appeared on the show in 1974 to present the Irving Thalberg Award to producer Lawrence Weingarten. Wearing a pantsuit and a pair of clogs, she told the standing crowd: “Thank you, very, very much. I am naturally deeply moved. I’m also very happy that I didn’t hear anyone call out, ‘It’s about time.’ ”

Beatty Ladies

Thirty years ago, nominee Warren Beatty’s date to the Oscars was the late Natalie Wood, the leading lady of his first film, “Splendor in the Grass.” His wife, Annette Bening, was just 3 years old.