A rare occurrence came to pass on Wednesday when an Oscar nominee for Best Original Song was disqualified from consideration. "Alone Yet Not Alone," a hymn-like song from the movie of the same title, was removed from eligibility after the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences decided that promotional methods used by composer Bruce Broughton violated rules for nominees.
The Academy investigated allegations Broughton had violated policy by reaching out to voting members of the Academy to promote his work. It was found that he e-mailed a number of the 239 total voting members to advertise "Alone Yet Not Alone." The composer claimed ignorance of any rules violations.
"I'm devastated," he told The Hollywood Reporter. "I indulged in the simplest grassroots campaign and it went against me when the song started getting attention. I got taken down by competition that had months of promotion and advertising behind them. I simply asked people to find the song and consider it."
On one hand, Broughton has little excuse to violate any of the Academy's rules: He used to be a governor, and is currently an executive committee member of the Academy music branch. On the other hand, "Alone Yet Not Alone" is a long shot nominee, and its competitors have quite a bit of money and publicity behind them. For example, the soundtrack of Frozen-which features nominee "Let It Go"-has sold nearly 770,000 copies as of last week's Billboard charts. Alone Yet Not Alone didn't even merit any reviews on RottenTomatoes.com.
The last Oscar nominated piece of music to get its nomination rescinded was the score for The Godfather in 1927, when it was discovered snippets of the compositions were taken from the 1958 film Fortunella.
It's probably a moot point, as both Pharrell Williams "Happy" from Despicable Me 2, and Idina Menzel's "Let It Go" are going to take a lot to beat.
