IT'S JUST A STATUE.

I don't understand all this fuss about the Academy Awards this year. Many actors are going to boycott the awards because they didn't honor excellent performances from black actors. The Academy Awards has never been fair. How can you even take seriously a group of people who gave The Greatest Show on Earth the best picture? The median age is 62, and most of the members probably didn't even see the films that were supposedly slighted. It's a popularity contest. Luise Rainer deserved the award for The Good Earth in 1937, but did she really earn it the year before in The Great Ziegfeld. No. The Oscar that Gregory Peck won for To Kill a Mockingbird probably should have gone to Peter O'Toole for Lawrence of Arabia. But it didn't. Boo hoo. There are hundreds of such stories. Undeserved winners. Fogotten stars. Favoritism among the Academy members is nothing new. So this year, take it on the chin. There are no blacks up for awards. But next year, who knows. I don't think it's spiteful or racist. It's just the way they voted, based on what they saw. Nobody knows how many black actors and films came close to being nominated, but were knocked out by the slimmest of margins. It's not worth making a federal case out of since it only smacks of sour grapes. Next year there will probably be another Glory, Lilies of the Field, The Defiant Ones, Ali, Hurricane, etc. If there is, nothing will make it seem like less of a honor than if one demands its recognition before it's even made. Not to mention that the awards has become a commercial heavy, long-winded bore.

Photo: Sidney Poitier accepts the 1963 award for Lilies of the Field. He also should have won for Raisin in the Sun, and several other films. But he didn't.  C'est la vie.