Jean-Luc Godard made headlines over the weekend when it was revealed that he won't be picking up his honorary Oscar in person this winter.
Apparently, the New Wave director's likely absence comes as a surprise to the Academy as well.
In a note to the organization's president Tom Sherak acknowledging the honor, Godard implied that, schedule permitting, he would come to Los Angeles for the November 13 Governors Awards event, the Academy said in a statement on Tuesday.
That contradicts what the director's partner Anne-Marie Mieville told an Australian reporter recently.
"Jean-Luc won’t go to America, he’s getting old for that kind of thing,” Mieville said. “Would you go all that way just for a bit of metal?”
Moreover, the combative tone seems different from the way the Academy describes Godard's response to the honor. The Academy said the director sent Sherak "a cordial, hand-written note," in which he thanked the organization and referred to himself as “the fourth musketeer,” in acknowledgement of the fact that three others (Kevin Brownlow, Francis Ford Coppola and Eli Wallach) are among the year’s honorees.
Best known for directing the seminal French New Wave film "Breathless" in 1960, Godard has been an outspoken critic of the Hollywood industry, taking pot shots at big-name directors such as Steven Spielberg.
