Meryl Streep may not win the Oscar this weekend because she's too ... brilliant. Too unbelievably talented, an actress who can do anything or disappear into anyone, from a drunk ("Ironweed") and dying wife and mother ("One True Thing") to a frosty fashion editor ("The Devil Wears Prada").
She is like the A-plus student who excels at everything she tackles and who is expected to be at the top of the class -- because she is Meryl Streep. She can meet and master any challenge, perfect any accent and appear to transform herself, no matter what the role demands.
As John F. Kennedy once said, "To whom much is given, much is required." Much has been given to Ms. Streep and much is required and, often, taken for granted.
Of course she can play Julia Child, even if that means creating the illusion that she's 6 foot 2, with a thicker midsection, curly brown hair, a lower voice and the ability to be moved almost to tears by superb food. She did just that in "Julie & Julia."
A judgmental nun? Been there, done that in "Doubt."
Divorced mother teaching violin to children in East Harlem? "Music of the Heart."
Blue-collar heroine whose battle for truth exacts the highest price? "Silkwood."
And the list goes on, all the way back to "The Deer Hunter" (1978) when she received her first Oscar nomination, and "Kramer vs. Kramer" (1979), when she won for the first time, in the supporting race. "Holy mackerel!" she exclaimed, from the podium of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.
Ms. Streep's second win, this time for leading actress, came in "Sophie's Choice" as a Polish concentration camp survivor who had faced a question about her children that was the embodiment of evil. When Sylvester Stallone opened the envelope on April 11, 1983, he announced her as "Marvelous Meryl Streep."
