Introducing the gushing index, a statistical tool for measuring how actors speak

WHEN Daniel Day-Lewis became the first person to win the Oscar for best actor three times, for his performance in "Lincoln", he gave an atypically witty, humble speech. Looking back at previous acceptance speeches for best leading actor and actress, The Economist has devised a “gushing index”—which expresses the share of words such as beautiful, dream and love in Oscar acceptance speeches as a share of the whole text. Two French actors have delivered the most gushing speeches on this metric; Jean Dujardin in 2011 for "The Artist" and Marion Cotillard in 2007 for "La Vie en Rose". Halle Berry’s 2001 speech is notable for both its actorly vocabulary and its length. Overall the index does not support the thesis that America is becoming more and more treacly. It does, however, suggest that actors have begun to gush more than actresses.