Mike Rickard's
NEWSBOYZ WRESTLING NETWORK

            Beverly Hills, CA- Wrestling fans were excited to learn that WWE superstar John Cena was nominated for his leading role in the film The Marine after a technical error.  While the nominations for the 79th Annual Academy Awards were last Tuesday, January 23, Academy officials announced an amendment to the list of contenders for the Best Actor Award after an investigation by the auditing firm of Price Waterhouse revealed that Cena’s nomination had been mistakenly confused with that of actor Will Smith.

            Longtime observers of the Academy Awards were initially shocked when Cena’s name was omitted from the Oscar nominations, especially given all the Oscar buzz that surrounded the release of his premiere film The Marine.  It didn’t take long before an investigation was ordered by Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences President Sid Ganis, an investigation which led to the discovery that Cena’s nomination had been mistakenly replaced by Will Smith for his role in the film The Pursuit of Happyness.

            While this isn’t the first time that the Academy Awards have been plagued by a clerical error (Marisa Tormei won the Best Supporting Actress Award in 1992 after Jack Palance mistakenly read her name as the winner and the Academy judged the snafu too embarrassing to correct), it didn’t take long to notice. 

            “With all due respect to Mr. Smith, there’s no way his work could be mentioned in the same breath as John Cena.  We here at the Academy haven’t seen a first-time role this good since Orson Welles starred in Citizen Kane sixty five years ago” Ganis said at a conference held in Stamford, Connecticut this afternoon.

             Cena’s fellow Best Actor nominee Peter O’Toole (nominated for his role in Venus) predicted a win by Cena, even though a loss by O’Toole will give him the dubious distinction of being nominated the most times for an Academy Award without a win.  Nevertheless O’Toole was gushing with praise for Cena. “I’ve been around Hollywood for a long time and I’ve never seen a kid with so much promise.  I learned something from watching Cena’s performance this weekend at the Academy’s screening of the nominated films.  I guess you can teach an old dog new tricks.”

            Will Smith was less than pleased by the Academy’s decision to amend the nominee list and replace his name with Cena’s.  After hearing about the correction, the recording artist and former star of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air challenged Cena to a battle rap competition at Wrestlemania XXIII should Cena win the Best Actor Award (as he is expected to) with the winner getting the coveted Oscar statuette. 

            In unrelated news, the Academy announced the creation of the Sid Ganis New Talent Fund, a twenty million dollar endowment fund paid for by World Wrestling Entertainment.