The Academy Awards have announced the 2010 hosts! They’ve named Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin as co-hosts of this awards season’s festivities. There were some rumors going around that the gig had been offered to 2009 Oscars host Hugh Jackman, who turned it down. There was also some mention that Neil Patrick Harris, Jon Stewart and Ricky Gervais might have gotten calls, or gotten mentioned in some meetings, but I don’t really believe any of them were seriously considered. Steve has hosted (solo) twice before, but this will Alec’s first time.

There are two hosts for the Oscars this year: Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin.

“I am happy to co-host the Oscars with my enemy Alec Baldwin,” Martin, 64, says in a statement.

Adds Baldwin, 51, “I don’t play the banjo, but I’m thrilled to be hosting the Oscars – it’s the opportunity of a lifetime.”

Martin previously hosted the 73rd and 75th Academy Awards. Baldwin was nominated for a 2003 supporting actor nominee for The Cooler.

Both have hosted Saturday Night Live.

“We think the team of Steve and Alec are the perfect pair of hosts for the Oscars,” said show producers Adam Shankman and Bill Mechanic. “Steve will bring the experience of having hosted the show in the past and Alec will be a completely fresh personality for this event.”

The 82nd Academy Awards air Sunday, March 7, on ABC.

[From Us Weekly]

Steve Martin is actually one of my favorite Oscar hosts of the past decade. I found him to be very witty, dry and professional during his previous hosting duties, and I think he’ll shine again with Alec as co-host. If they attempt any song-and-dance numbers (like Hugh Jackman did earlier this year), you know it will be chaos. Now if we can only get the Academy to not jam 50 pounds of crap into a five pound bag.

Steve Martin feels so strongly about a play he penned in 1993, about Pablo Picasso and Albert Einstien meeting in a bar, that he is willing to fund a high school production of the play after it was nearly banned.

“Rent” isn’t the only show proving to be too provocative for some parents of high school students. A month after controversy over a production of “Rent” at a high school in Newport Beach, Calif., the comedian Steve Martin, left, has offered to pay for an off-campus production of one of his plays because its performance was banned by an Oregon school, The Associated Press reported. Parents at La Grande High School objected to what they called adult content in Mr. Martin’s 1993 play, “Picasso at the Lapin Agile,” about an imagined meeting between Albert Einstein and Pablo Picasso in a Paris bar. The school board halted rehearsals after receiving a petition signed by 137 people. In a letter published on Friday in The La Grande Observer, Mr. Martin offered to pay for the production because, he wrote, he wanted to keep the play “from acquiring a reputation it does not deserve.”

New York Times

Wiki says the play features Picasso and Einstien meeting in 1904, before their achievements of painting Les Demoiselles d’Avignon and publishing the theory of relativity. They are joined by various characters and discuss the shaping of the 20th century through art, science and commercialism. It also has an un-named but obvious Elvis coming in and explaining that genius isn’t just academic or the result of ‘brains’.

This seems a lighthearted, fun way of discussing the 20th century and giving students at the school, as well as the actors in the school production, a way to be introduced to historical characters outside of a textbook. The school has around 700 students, so 135 signatures in protest against the play is not a very broad representation of the school, if there was outrage I’m guessing numbers would be higher. This is not the first time a high school has taken on this production, but the newly funded production will be held off campus.

Steve Martin addressed the play and the school in The Observer.

Focusing on Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity and Picasso’s master painting, “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon,” the play attempts to explain, in a light-hearted way, the similarity of the creative process involved in great leaps of imagination in art and science. Pablo Picasso, as a historical figure, does not come gift-wrapped for the sensitive. He lived as he painted, fully sexual and fully daring, and in the play he is chastised by a sage bartendress for his cavalier behavior toward women.

Because of the controversy, I recently reread the play, and, frankly, I could understand how some parents might object to certain lines if they were to be delivered by a 16- or 17-year-old. Yet I do believe that the spirit of the play and its endorsement of the arts and sciences are appropriate for young eyes and minds.

So while the question of whether students should perform the play at their high school remains something to be determined by the community, I firmly believe that seeing the play will bring no harm to them and might well uplift them — and acting in the play, if they are permitted by their parents, would also bring them no harm, and may help them to understand the potency, power and beauty of the arts and sciences.

I suspect that the signers of the petition against the production read excerpts only, and were not shown the more delicate and inspirational parts of the script.

To prevent the play from acquiring a reputation it does not deserve, I would like to offer this proposal: I will finance a non-profit, off-high school campus production (low-budget, I hope!), supervised and/or directed by Mr. Cahill and cast at his discretion, so that individuals, outside the jurisdiction of the school board but within the guarantees of freedom of expression provided by the Constitution of the United States, can determine whether they will or will not see the play, even if they are under 18.

I predict that the experience will not be damaging, but meaningful.

The Observer of La Grande- read the full statement here

It shows a real passion to put yourself on the firing line in this way, particularly for a play that was written 16 years ago. I think the part of the play parents might object to is the character of Gaston who has no interest beyond sex and drinking.

Unused funds from Steve Martin’s donation will go to acting scholarships for students.

Steve Martin is shown at a photocall for The Pink Panther 2 in Spain on 2/11/09. Credit: PRPhotos

Steven Colbert did a parody of the Christian Bale rant on his Comedy Central show “The Colbert Report” last night. Colbert went off on Steve Martin, telling him he was distracting him from his talking. It was a loose interpretation of Bale’s tirade, with Colbert repeating the famous line “We are done professionally.”

James Lipton from The Actor’s Studio played both Bale and the subject of his ire in a brilliant word for word reenactment on Conan last night. You can tell what a great actor Lipton is just from this brief performance.

There’s buzz that Bale’s leaked outburst may cost him an Oscar next year. He’s slated to star in Public Enemies with Johnny Depp, which comes out this summer. It’s not likely people are going to forget Bale’s rant, whatever the circumstances that prompted it.

Thanks to popcrunch for featuring these videos.

Steve Martin invited some friends over on the weekend – and got married.

Martin’s publicist Alan Nierob said former Nebraska Senator Bob Kerrey, a friend of the actor, presided over the ceremony at Martin’s home.

Lorne Michaels, creator of the US comedy show Saturday Night Live, was Martin’s best man, Nierob said.

Most of the 75 guests – including actors Tom Hanks, Diane Keaton, Eugene Levy and Carl Reiner – were not told that Martin and Stringfield would wed when they were invited to the “house party”, Nierob said.

Martin, 61, was previously married to actress Victoria Tennant, whom he divorced in 1994 after about eight years together, Nierob said.

It was the first marriage for Stringfield, 35, a writer for US Vogue and former staffer of The New Yorker magazine.

The couple had dated for about three years, Nierob said.

Sydney Morning Herald

But the question we all want the answer to is – how much did the photos sell for? Were there any embarassing Father of the Bride moments? Because I can think of one – the father of the bride would be around the same age as the groom. That and the fact the groom was sporting a Pink Panther Inspector Clouseau moustache for his upcoming movie. Fortunately the movie actually is the Pink Panther, so people should have been understanding.

Update by Celebitchy: The National Enquirer said these two were about to get married, and has an article this week about Steve and Anne’s relationship and how they met.

The comedian met Anne – who’s 27 years his junior – when he began writing for “The New Yorker” magazine five years ago.

On the surface, Steve and Anne seem an unlikely pair. He’s a Hollywood star, and she’s an intellectual.

“But many people don’t realize that Steve is a very accomplished writer and an art collector,” said the friend.

[From The National Enquirer, print edition, August 6, 2007]

The Enquirer says that Anne helped Steve overcome “devastating bouts of temporary depression” and that she helped him see the lighter side of life.

Journalist Anne was instrumental in getting Steve to write his autobiography. His book “Born Standing Up” is set to come out in November of this year.

Anne is the woman many of us mistook for Kirstin Davis when she was seen frolicking on the beach with Steve early last year.

Header image is a scan from The National Enquirer. Beach photos from Jossip and Sky Showbiz. Thanks to Compleatsteve.com for the black and white inset photo.