Christopher Walken is devastated that he’s never won a Razzie: “I care very much”
Any actor who claims they don’t care about winning awards is probably a liar, although Christopher Walken might be the only one who’d admit their failure to win a Razzie continues to haunt them.
Every actor dreams of sitting in a crowded auditorium, surrounded by their peers, and hearing their name read aloud onstage. Making that walk to the podium for an acceptance speech is the pinnacle of a career’s worth of hard work, unless it’s a Golden Raspberry.
Of course, barely any notable name in Hollywood who wins a Razzie turns up to accept it in person, with Halle Berry, Sandra Bullock, and Paul Verhoeven three who famously embraced the ignominy to poke fun at their misguided choices, which Walken has apparently been watching afar with jealous eyes.
He’s won an Academy Award for The Deer Hunter, claimed a Bafta for Catch Me If You Can, and been shortlisted at the Golden Globes, Primetime Emmys, and Tonys, but the eccentric icon has his own set of typically peculiar reasons for lamenting the fact that his trophy cabinet continues to be Razzie-less.
Eddie Murphy, Sylvester Stallone, and Adam Sandler have become fixtures of the ceremony after racking up dozens of nominations and countless wins for their combined sins against cinema, but Walken has only ever made the shortlist twice, which is pretty decent going, considering how many forgettable features he’s made.
On one occasion, he had the rare distinction of being in the running for an Oscar and a Razzie in the same year, with his ‘Best Supporting Actor’ nod at the former for Steven Spielberg’s fleet-footed crime caper going head-to-head with his dismal turn in the critical and commercial catastrophe, The Country Bears.
When asked how it felt to be competing with himself at opposite ends of the awards season spectrum, Walken mounted a passionate defence of the latter, which makes sense, when he was about the only person involved with Gigli who had anything kind to say about it.
“Well, I liked The Country Bears,” he informed About Film. “And I thought I was good in The Country Bears. Didn’t you think I was funny, with my little shoes?” He was subsequently quizzed on whether it bothered him not to win, and his answer was unequivocal.
“I do care,” he declared of his desire to be named victorious at the show that celebrates the worst the industry has to offer. “I care very much. I want to win them.” Walken’s reason for wanting to add a Razzie to his collection makes sense, albeit as the inverse of the norm. It’s an award, so he wouldn’t mind having one, even if it’s the prize nobody really wants.
Unfortunately, to use the term loosely, his performance in The Country Bears was snubbed in favour of Hayden Christensen’s wooden work in Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones. His second nomination came the very next year, only for Walken to lose out to Stallone’s cringeworthy ‘Toymaker’ in Robert Rodriguez’s Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over. Maybe one day he’ll get a Razzie, but seeing as he hasn’t even been considered for over 20 years, it seems unlikely.
