Six Degrees of Makin’ Bacon

By Phil Buckridge

It's 2008. Another year's Academy Awards have come and gone, and in case you missed it, a bunch of people took home awards and a merry time was had by all. However, lost in the Oscar afterglow was the fact that, once again, the Academy failed to honor the night's biggest winner, Kevin Bacon.

Yes, in yet another year Bacon has slept with the Best Actress award winner through his movie roles, and in yet another year, the Academy has failed to acknowledge it. I just don't get it.

When you take the time to look at everyone Kevin Bacon has slept with in movies, and then look at everyone they've slept with in movies, it's not a stretch to say he's probably transitively nailed every actor, actress, director, producer, composer, and key grip in the entire Academy. And how do they repay him? They snub him year after year. I mean, what does the poor guy need to do to get the recognition he deserves?

Well, Kevin Bacon may be too much of a gentleman to press the issue, but I am not. So it's time to take matters into my own hands. I've compiled the following list showing how Kevin Bacon has slept with every Best Actress winner from the past ten years through movie roles. It's my hope that it might inspire the Academy to create a new award category for Mr. Bacon, or at the very least, put him over the top for next year's Lifetime Achievement Award.

Ladies and Gentlemen of the Academy, I submit the following for your consideration.

1998
Gwyneth Paltrow lets Joseph Fiennes drive his sonnet home in Shakespeare in Love (Picture: 1. Fiennes then plays a mountain climber who plants his flagstick deep inside the summit of Heather Graham in Killing Me Softly (Picture: 1). Graham goes for a ride on Colin Firth's Union Jack in Hope Springs. Firth feeds his girth to Rachel Blanchard in Where the Truth Lies (Picture: 1) before alley-ooping her over to Kevin Bacon for the easy slam dunk in the same movie.

1999 & 2004
Hilary Swank gets tapped by gumshoe Josh Hartnett in The Black Dahlia (Picture: 1). Hartnett hits Homecoming Queen Kirsten Dunst with the crotch-body block on a football field in The Virgin Suicides. Dunst gets her rocks off with Mark Ruffalo in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Ruffalo props Naomi Watts up against an oak tree while giving her some wood of his own in We Don't Live Here Anymore. Watts shows us there isn't a fabric on this earth that she couldn't nip through while getting it on with Sean Penn in 21 Grams (Picture: 1). Sean decided to give his future ex-wife, Robin Wright, a test drive in State of Grace (Picture: 1). Robin finally throws Tom Hanks a bone by letting him bury his in Forrest Gump (Picture: 1). Hanks gives Elizabeth Perkins a little bit of statutory sausage in Big, and Perkins and Kevin Bacon enjoy a little shower shag in He Said, She Said (Picture: 1).

2000*
Julia Roberts gives Richard Gere the finest fur money can buy in Pretty Woman (Picture: 1). Psychiatrist Gere pulls out his dic(k)taphone to gauge what's going on inside Kim Basinger in Final Analysis (Picture: 1). Basinger gets bonked eight ways to Sunday by Mickey Rourke in 9 ½ Weeks (Picture: 1). Rourke gets a slice of Elizabeth McGovern in Johnny Handsome (Picture: 1), and McGovern slyly makes Kevin Bacon realize that "his boys can swim" in She's Having a Baby.

*Julia and Kevin's scene from Flatliners has been ruled too inconclusive to use.

2001
Halle Berry reels in Billy Bob Thornton's swordfish during a marathon sex scene in Monster's Ball (Picture: 1). Billy Bob frequently pays Amber Rules for a little motel magic in Monster's Ball (Picture: 1), though he chokes on camera right as he's about to bury it from the back. In a great case of "like father, like son," Amber also lets Thornton's son, Heath Ledger, plow her from behind in Monster's Ball (Picture: 1). Ledger then gets a little guy-on-guy action going with Jake Gyllenhaal in Brokeback Mountain. Gyllenhaal does the world a favor by banging Jennifer Aniston into showing her first glimpse of on-screen nip in The Good Girl (Picture: 1). Aniston then enjoys some inter-office intercourse with Kevin Bacon in Picture Perfect.

2002
Nicole Kidman helps Jude Law unload his musket balls in Civil War movie Cold Mountain (Picture: 1). Law's plugging of Jennifer Jason Leigh's nether region gets them transported to a nether world in eXistenZ. Leigh's deceptive makeover lets her fool Steven Weber into the sack in Single White Female (Picture: 1). Weber also gets a piece of Bridget Fonda in Single White Female (Picture: 1). Fonda makes every guy in America want to propose when she shows Robert De Niro that two of her favorite hobbies are bong hits and banging in Jackie Brown (Picture: 1). De Niro shows off his criminal side as he forces himself onto Elizabeth McGovern in Once Upon a Time in America (Picture: 1). McGovern, as we covered before, gets knocked up by Kevin Bacon in She's Having a Baby.

2003
Charlize Theron gets to know Stuart Townsend in the biblical sense in Head in the Clouds (Picture: 1). Townsend sleeps with Kate Hudson . . . and pretty much the rest of her family in About Adam (Picture: 1). Hudson shows how much she loves rock 'n' roll by getting down with Billy Crudup in Almost Famous (Picture: 1), and Crudup got up close and personal with Kevin Bacon's penal code while serving juvy time in Sleepers.

2005
Reese Witherspoon (Picture: 1) decides to shed her strict moral code . . . and her clothes as she gives it up to Ryan Phillippe in Cruel Intentions. Phillippe gets to party in Kelly Lynch's roadhouse for a brief few seconds before she cuts it short in Homegrown (Picture: 1). Lynch plays a jewel thief who lets David Caruso plunder her treasure in Cold Around the Heart (Picture: 1). Caruso gets it on with Kathryn Erbe in Kiss of Death, and Erbe lets Kevin Bacon stir it up in Stir of Echoes (Picture: 1).

2006
Helen Mirren gives up her tea and crumpets to David Morrissey in Cause célèbre (Picture: 1). Morrissey gets his turn with village bicycle Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct 2 (Picture: 1). Stone gives voyeur Stephen Baldwin a lot more than eye candy in Sliver (Picture: 1). Baldwin gives it a go with another Mr. Skin Hall-of-Famer, Kari Wuhrer, in Spider's Web (Picture: 1). Wuhrer gets her bedroom la bamba on with Lou Diamond Phillips in Boulevard (Picture: 1). L.D.P. gets some tang from fellow astronaut Robin Tunney in Supernova (Picture: 1). Tunney takes a quick at-bat for the other team with Hope Davis in The Secret Lives of Dentists, and Davis also performs her wifely duties for Campbell Scott in The Secret Lives of Dentists. Scott lets Kyra Sedgwick have a jam session with his mother love bone in alt-rock-laden Singles (and once more in Loverboy (Picture: 1)). Sedgwick merges real life and screen life as she gets boffed by real-life husband Kevin Bacon in The Woodsman (Picture: 1).

2007
Marion Cotillard (Picture: 1) goes for a ride on Russell Crowe's blimp in A Good Year. Crowe intimately interrogates Kim Basinger in L.A. Confidential, and Basinger, as was covered previously, gets to know Richard's Gere in Final Analysis. Gere plays an OB/GYN that goes N2/GYN with 1997's Best Actress winner, Helen Hunt, in Dr. T and the Women (Picture: 1). Helen Hunt gives some first-degree loving to Kevin Spacey and his third-degree burns in Pay it Forward. Spacey throws Rhona Mitra up against a sink and proceeds to lay some serious pipe in The Life of David Gale (Picture: 1). Mitra then receives an unsolicited and invisible package delivery from Kevin Bacon in Hollow Man (Picture: 1).

Ladies and gentlemen of the Academy, I can only hope that you do the right thing by making sure Kevin Bacon gets his statue next year . . . because you know he will have slept with your Best Actress.