Best Actress Rewind: 1987

Oscar Nominees

Cher ... Moonstruck
Glenn Close ... Fatal Attraction
Holly Hunter ... Broadcast News
Sally Kirkland ... Anna
Meryl Streep ... Ironweed

Mazur Nominees

Glenn Close … Fatal Attraction

Lindsay Crouse … House of Games

Holly Hunter … Raising Arizona

Julie Walters … Personal Services

Joanne Woodward … The Glass Menagerie

Oscar Winner: Inexplicably, voters went with the star turn from Cher, doing solid work in a limp rom-com with poor direction. Cher also starred in the box office hit The Witches of Eastwick and Suspect, a thriller in which she played an attorney. This trifecta of films showcased the veteran entertainer’s versatility and box office clout and likely factored into her eventual win.

Mazur’s Winner: While Woodward is electric as Amanda Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie, directed by her husband Paul Newman, and a deserving winner, Close simply cannot be ignored. Though she was not the first choice to play Alex Forrest, the actress made her creation a perfectly-modulated, damaged woman rather than a soulless cartoon, as written. Only an actress of Close’s power and training could have pulled this off—the sexiness, the craziness and the wounded heart—for playing such a brilliantly human villainess my award goes to Glenn.