While there is always something to be said about invention, progress, the new, we are also sure to find ourselves, time and time again, reveling in our pasts. Our memories. The way we were.
Okay, that was kind of a hokey introduction, but I’m all swept up in Barbra Streisand’s chilling reunion with her old Oscar winning number, “The Way We Were.” At the 85th Annual Academy Awards, the one-named sensation Barbra — heroine to just about every subculture you can think of — paid tribute to a deceased icon in the Hollywood music business, Marvin Hamlisch. Closing out the “In Memorium” segment of the Oscars was a particular homage to Hamlisch, esteemed composer and conductor responsible for the scores of classic films dating from the 1960s straight through 2009 (his final movie being Steven Soderbergh’s The Informant!).
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Streisand took the stage to speak earnestly on her old collaborator Hamlisch, treating the world to a tearful, shiver-inducing rendition of the Oscar-winning title song from the 1973 romance The Way We Were.
Proving duly that not an inkling of talent has strayed from her superhuman pipes since she first brought the song to life 40 years back, Streisand managed to make us all delve back upon our own memories of times gone by. Whatever they may be — the golden years of our innocent youths, old flames flickered out, that time we got those really good pancakes from the diner on 23rd Street — they crept right up on us when Streisand belted out the soothing yet haunting refrain of “The Way We Were.”
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And in a night devoted entirely to Hollywood music, we find ourselves faced with a true highlight. In company as impressive as Adele, Shirley Bassey, Jennifer Hudson, and Catherine Zeta-Jones, Streisand’s is quite possibly the best performance of the night.
And now to the VHS shelves to watch The Way We Were, for the thirtieth time…
[Photo Credit: Mark Davis/WireImage]
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