Rex Reed

Rex Reed
Born	Rex Taylor Reed October 2, 1938 (1938-10-02) Fort Worth, Texas, U.S.
Occupation	Film critic

Rex Taylor Reed (born October 2, 1938) is an American film critic and former co-host of the syndicated television show At the Movies. He currently writes the column "On the Town with Rex Reed" for The New York Observer.

Life and career

Reed was born in Fort Worth, Texas, the son of Jewell (née Smith) and James M. Reed, an oil company supervisor.

Reed has acted occasionally, most notably in the movie version of Gore Vidal's Myra Breckinridge. Reed also appeared in the films Inchon! and Superman (as himself), and was a regular on the TV show The Gong Show in the late '70s. Reed additionally served on the jury at the 21st Berlin International Film Festival in 1971, and guest voiced as himself on the animated series The Critic.

Rex Reed appears in the 2009 documentary For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism explaining how important film critics were in the 1970s, and complaining about the proliferation of unqualified critical voices on the Internet.

Reed is good friends with gossip columnist Liz Smith. He is a member of New York Film Critics Circle and, because his reviews appear on the Internet, he is a member of New York Film Critics Online.

He lives at the famed Dakota apartment building, in New York City. Reed is openly gay.

Controversies

Marisa Tomei Academy Awards rumor

After Jack Palance presented the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress to Marisa Tomei in 1992, Reed started a rumour that Palance had erroneously called out the wrong name because he was unable to read the printing on the card inside the envelope, became confused or was too "drunk" or "stoned" to announce the winner properly. By 1997 Reed was espousing on television his claim that a "massive cover-up" was underway to prevent the public from finding out about the mistake.

Critic Roger Ebert commented on his website that "Not only is the rumor untrue, it is unfair to Marisa Tomei, and Rex Reed owes her an apology." The Academy has stated that if such a mistake had occurred, representatives from Price Waterhouse would have stepped onstage to correct it.

Arrest

In February 2000, Reed was arrested for shoplifting after leaving a Tower Records, in Manhattan, with CDs by Mel Tormé, Peggy Lee, and Carmen McRae in his jacket pockets. Reed, who had just purchased two other CDs, says he forgot about the other three CDs and his offer to pay for them was refused. The charges were later dropped. According to Reed, several days after the arrest Peggy Lee sent him her entire catalog of CDs, because "she was so thrilled I wanted one of her CDs enough to put myself through so much hell."

Oldboy review

In a 2005 review of the South Korean movie Oldboy, Reed wrote: "What else can you expect from a nation weaned on kimchi, a mixture of raw garlic and cabbage buried underground until it rots, dug up from the grave and then served in earthenware pots sold at the Seoul airport as souvenirs?" The Village Voice, which stated that "online forums erupted in protest" at the review, then mocked Reed by imagining him applying similar logic to films from other countries.

Bibliography

• Reed, Rex (1969). Do you sleep in the nude?. London: Allen. ISBN 0-491-00043-X. 
• Reed, Rex (1974). People are crazy here. New York: Delacorte Press. ISBN 0-440-07365-0. 
• Reed, Rex (1977). Valentines & vitriol. New York: Delacorte Press. ISBN 0-440-09336-8. 
• Reed, Rex (1987). Personal Effects. New York: Jove Books. ISBN 0-441-66220-X. 
• Reed, Rex (1992). Rex Reed's Guide to Movies on TV and Video, 1992-1993. Warner Books. ISBN 0446362069. 

External links

• Rex Reed's New York Observer movie review archive
• New York Film Critics Circle biography
• Rex Reed at the Internet Movie Database