What's In A Nom?

Today they're Oscar nominees, but on March 24 they'll become the world's worst audience. ''You try to behave like an adult and it's impossible,'' admits Ali's Jon Voight -- who, as a four-time nominee and winner for 1978's Coming Home, is an expert attendee. ''We're all thinking about...what's my speech going to be.'' That is, if they're thinking at all: ''I'll be the dazed, bald, fat man in the corner,'' predicts Gosford Park scribe Julian Fellowes. For many, the night will be about losing gracefully -- an art Monsters, Inc. composer Randy Newman (nominated 16 times, never a winner) has mastered: ''I've gotten really good at standing up to let others pass.'' Former winner Judi Dench (Iris) is already bracing for the worst: ''It will be a sitting-down evening for me.'' But Tom Wilkinson (In the Bedroom) shows no such resignation: ''You need a nice British hooligan element to liven things up. We'll start a few fights.''