Do you REALLY think that he"s relapsed and is drinking again and that is what caused his roll over car accident? Or is it just something that you and your fellow gossip brethern are putting out there to make the story more salacious? I mean, I"ve got friends in Los Angeles, I"ve been there and the roads he was driving on are pretty curvy. I mean, the CNN.com story said that it was at 2:30 in the afternoon. And why in the WORLD would that jeopardize his Oscar chances? Totally wasn"t his fault, you know...didn"t seem to hurt Halle Berry. :) Dear Carly, I didn"t say he relapsed. I just said the rumours are already buzzing that he did. In my mind, of course he didn"t relapse. He is perfect, he is my #1, and I love him. Do I find it odd that his brakes would just go out for no apparent reason on a sunny day? Yes, I do. Do I think (as suggested by my eTalk producer Duana) that he"s the kind of guy that might not take care to check his brakes or change them when they need maintaining? Yes, as well. Which makes him kinda spacey, and we knew that already but I have to tell you, it"s definitely not the sexiest quality in a man, you know what I mean? As for his Oscar chances. Any bad press hurts your Oscar chances. Trust me. Look at Russell Crowe. His is an extreme example, I know, but he was the favourite of all favourites for A Beautiful Mind until he beat the crap out of some guy at the BAFTAs a month before the big show and Denzel Washington scooped it up from under his nose. Halle? I seem to recall there was a good 2 years - an eternity in Hollywood - between the car incident and the Oscar, during which time she was on her best behaviour, with her then husband, playing mother to his young daughter, talking to Oprah about her depression and her rebound and her suicide attempt and crying a whole hell of a lot and winning people over left right and centre. Which is something Joaquin is refusing to do. Combine this reticence with the fact that people assume he travels underneath a dark cloud and it"s not a recipe for victory. I still hold out hope though. There are Academy voters who really, really WANT to give it to him. And they WANT to give it to him over Philip Seymour Hoffman. But he has to at least pretend, just for 5 minutes, that he would like the honour. Otherwise, why would they bother??? Would you bake a cake for someone who insisted they never ate dessert???