Oscars 2015: Canadian talent celebrated ahead of Academy Awards
Canadian Oscar nominees honoured Thursday night with swishy gala in Beverly Hills
The Oscars are still three days away, but the party has already started for Canadians nominated at this year's Academy Awards.
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Telefilm Canada, the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television and the Consulate General of Canada in Los Angeles paid special tribute to Canadian Oscar contenders in a gala Thursday night at the Four Seasons Los Angeles at Beverly Hills Hotel.
Thursday's Canada Stars in Awards Season event honours excellence in film and television and featured a number of high-profile talents, including:
- Eric McCormack
- Cameron Bailey
- Don McKellar
- Jason Priestley
- Craig Mann
- Dean DeBlois
- Graham Annable
- Joshua Bartholomew
- Torill Kove
- Norman Jewison
- Sandra Oh
Kove, Annable, DeBlois, Bartholomew and his American wife and co-writing partner, Lisa Rae Harriton, tell CBC's Kim Brunhuber how they're getting ready for the Oscars in the video above.
The soiree also recognized select nominees for this year's Canadian Screen Awards which will be handed out March 1 in Toronto.
Canada representing
There are a good number of Canadians either nominated or with connections to nominated films, at this Sunday's Academy Awards. Canada is especially well-represented in the animated feature category, with three out of five films coming from Canadian directors. Of those three Canucks, two are best friends.
"We met working at Disney on Mulan, in the story department 20 years ago. We had a cubicle wall between us and we hit it off and we've been really close ever since," says Williams, who was born in Columbia, Mo., to Canadian parents and raised in Kitchener, Ont.
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This Sunday, the duo will be watching the Academy Awards together alongside fellow Canadian animator Graham Annable, who co-directed the intricate stop-motion film The Boxtrolls.
Jay Baruchel, from Montreal's Notre-Dame-de-Grâce neighbourhood, is the voice of the lead character in Dragon 2.
Me and My Moulton
Norway-born, Montreal-raised Torill Kove is up for a prize in the best animated short film category for Me and My Moulton. Kove has been nominated for an Academy Award for each short in her personal animated shorts trilogy, including Moulton, 1999's My Grandmother Ironed the King's Shirts and 2006's The Danish Poet, which won the award.
"I do feel like I'm part of this amazing Canadian animation legacy," Kove told CBC Radio's As It Happens in January. "It's really a wonderful place for an animator to work, especially for animators who are interested in making personal films, to explore new ways of doings things, make their auteur pieces."
Lego Movie & technical nominations
While fan favourite The Lego Movie missed out on an animated feature nod, its infectious anthem Everything is Awesome was nominated for best original song. The popular song was co-written by Joshua Bartholomew of Pembroke, Ont., and performed by the award-winning duo Teagan and Sara from Calgary.
Other Canadians are getting nods for their technical skills. Cameron Waldbauer, from Pitt Meadows, B.C., was nominated as part of the visual effects team for X-Men: Days of Future Past.
And Craig Mann, who was born in Oakville, Ont., is part of the team nominated for Sound Mixing on Whiplash.
How to watch
The 87th Academy Awards will be given out at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Calif. on Sunday, beginning at 8:30 p.m. ET with the red carpet starting at 7 p.m. ET on ABC and CTV in Canada.
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CBC arts team is on the ground in Hollywood and will be live blogging from the parties, the red carpet and behind the scenes all weekend.
Watch for full coverage, including photo galleries and all the winners, here on CBCNews.ca/arts.
CBC's film critic Eli Glasner will be live chatting with the CBC Community Team in the aftermath of the awards Monday starting at 12 p.m. ET.
with files from The Canadian Press