Title: I'd rather party than win an Oscar; Life is just about as good as it gets these days for Jack Nicholson. He's tipped for Oscar glory this month and he's reunited with the mother of two of his children. But, as he revealed to Showbiz Editor JOHN MILLAR, some habits are hard to break.(Features)

Date: 3/6/1998; Publication: Daily Record (Glasgow, Scotland); Author: Millar, John

Double Oscar winner Jack Nicholson is in the running to claim a hat-trick of those coveted gold statuettes.

He notched up his ELEVENTH Academy Award nomination for a highly- acclaimed performance in the comedy, As Good As It Gets.

But wolfman Jack insists he would rather go home empty-handed than win a coveted Academy Award - so he can PARTY the night away.

The star, who has proved you can still be sexy at 60, told me: "I love glamour and I always love awards evenings themselves. But my idea of a great evening is to be nominated for an Academy Award and know that you are not going to win.

"Because then you have a fantastic night with people that you don't see that often. It's very relaxed and fabulous."

But Jack better not look out his party hat just yet.

As Good As It Gets reunites the actor with writer/director James L. Brooks and the last time they worked together, Jack walked off with an Oscar for Terms Of Endearment.

There is another sign that he might again be holding an Oscar aloft on the big night. Jack and co-star Helen Hunt - of Twister fame - started on the award trail by grabbing Golden Globes for this spicey comedy, which opens next Friday.

That's usually a clue for Oscar glory. But the star, whose hits include One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, Prizzi's Honor, Reds, Easy Rider and Chinatown, refuses to count his chickens.

When we met at London's opulent Dorchester Hotel he was extremely cautious when asked how he rated his Academy Award chances.

He reminded me that comedies, no matter how well received at the box office, have an unfortunate tradition of being overlooked on Hollywood's biggest night of glittering prizes. He said: "The Academy rather tend to under-rate comedy acting but I don't know why because it is more difficult."

But he readily conceded that receiving an Oscar can add a few fat zeros on to an actor's pay poke and give their career a genuine boost.

He said: "We won a few Golden Globes for As Good As It Gets when it was released in America against a lot of very big, blockbuster films. And I believe that those awards helped get the audience to the picture.

"There's also a complimentary feeling about being nominated. Basically, as has been said, awards are false but, after all, I'm a clown not a mystic and I enjoy them."

JACK' S performance in As Good As It Gets has been hailed as his finest in ages. And he acknowledges that acclaim with endearing modesty.

Sporting his trademark grin, he laughed: "I would like to take the credit. But this was one of the finest parts that I have ever been offered. It was all in the script."

In the bitingly-sharp comedy, Jack portrays a novelist who is one of the nastiest men in New York. He is a character who prides himself in the battery of insults that he fires at anyone who crosses his bath.

Gays, complete strangers, restaurant service, the state of cutlery, even his neighbour's little puppy, are on the receiving end of his acidic tongue.

Jack revels in the devilish role ... hardly surprising since he played Old Nick himself in The Witches Of Eastwick.

But I wondered whether, away from the movie cameras, this very politely spoken actor could shed his good manners and explode into a tirade of rudeness. His character in As Good As It Gets is a sufferer of obsessive- compulsive disorder, which means he has a fixation about tidiness and has to go through rituals, like never treading on a crack in the pavement.

Jack told me that he didn't suffer from any similar hang-ups.

He said: "I keep a nice neat room and so on, but I'm just a regular person in that way. I'm not phobic at all.

"But I do carry my own ashtray."

Even though he turned 60 last year, Nicholson still plays the bad-boy about town role and shows no sign of giving up his wickedly sexy Jack the Lad image.

He chuckled: "It's a little more exciting in the evening than the morning. It's great, wonderful. I've always been that way."

Jack has been linked with many beautiful women, but now he only has eyes for 34-year-old Rebecca Broussard - mother of two of his children.

And it seems their relationship may now be on a more permanent footing, despite splitting up several times.

JACK said: "It hit me very hard when she left me five years back. No matter what, Rebecca and my children will stay the biggest part of my life.

"Whenever we're apart, I keep realising how much I miss her."

Hollywood has recognised Jack Nicholson's talent by presenting him with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Although he was highly honoured, he refuses to look back over his big screen exploits.

He said: "I don't like watching my movies on television that much. So I don't see them much after I'm done.

"Occasionally, I do and either I'm appalled or once again in love with myself."

And those Roger Corman B-movies - such as creaky old chillers The Raven and The Terror - are very definitely a no-go area.

"I never watch any of the Corman movies that I made. And I recommend that no-one else does too," laughed Jack.

Back then, in the early 1960s, Jack appeared in those low-budget horror films because he was desperate for work.

For the past two decades, however, he has been an A-list player who gets offered the cinematic cream.

He said: "I have been able to pick and choose for a long time. It's pretty much if the script is good, the part is good. I haven't been offered a lot of robot parts.

"I think I'm lucky that, when somebody writes a script of quality, I would be one of the dozen or so actors that they would think of. So I really only read those scripts."

Being able to cherrypick the best or most challenging roles keeps Jack Nicholson well satisfied.

It also means that he is a long, long way from bringing the curtain down on his movie career.

Asked by a nervous young lady why he didn't contemplate retirement, Jack the lad had an answer that was vintage Nicholson ...

"I feel you'd miss me, honey."

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