It’s Gone To His Head

Bret McKenzie celebrated his Oscar nomination for best song with some Vegemite and toast. McKenzie, who wrote the meta-power ballad ‘Man or Muppet’ for The Muppets, is up against ‘Real in Rio’ from Rio: The Movie, written by Siedah Garrett. “What’s great is there’s a 50 per cent chance of winning,” McKenzie said. “The only thing that would be better is if there was only one nomination.” He was excited to be one of the few New Zealanders to win kudos from the Academy. “By the time I’ve done a few of these interviews, I’ll have a joke about Peter Jackson,” he said. “It’s gone to my head already.” McKenzie told the Guardian that it took a while for the scale of the Muppets’ job to dawn on him. “I think the day they told me they were going to translate the movie into 18 languages, it made me realise the song needed to be good.” The 84th Academy Awards will be held on 26 February in Los Angeles.