Their work on, off screen prompts academy’s salute

And Short’s joking comment aside, the evening made for a heartfelt tribute to three movie legends - Steve Martin, Angela Lansbury and Italian costume designer Piero Tosi, picking up honorary awards for their body of work - and to Angelina Jolie, winner of the academy’s Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.

George Lucas and Gena Rowlands were among those presenting Jolie the award for the work she has done during more than 40 field missions with the United Nations refugee agency, as well as her countless other social justice efforts.

Jolie spoke eloquently of the impact the work she has done with the U.N. and other agencies has had on her life.

“I have never understood why some people are lucky enough to be born with the chance that I had to have this path in life,” Jolie said, “and why, across the world, there’s a woman just like me, the same abilities, the same desires, the same work ethic and love for her family, who would most likely make better films than me - better speeches. Only she sits in a refugee camp. She has no voice. … I don’t know why this is my life and that’s hers. But I will do as my mother asked and I will do the best I can with this life to be of use.”

Unlike Jolie, Martin broke down a couple of times, overcome with appreciation for the ways that working in movies have affected his life. And this was after an introduction by Short that resembled a Friars roast and had the audience roaring. (“Of all the people I have a fake showbiz friendship with,” Short said of his “Three Amigos” costar, “Steve is the person I’m fake closest to.”)

Tom Hanks compared Martin to H.L. Mencken, Voltaire, Satchel Paige and Yogi Berra, and Martin, holding his Oscar while Hanks stood to the side, initially joked that he couldn’t express how excited he was because “the Botox is fresh.”

But Martin soon turned thoughtful, and emotional.

“To get an award for something that you realize has seeped into your bones and to understand tonight that the work over the decades has at least meant something to someone is especially satisfying,” he said. “But working in movies has also brought an amazing gift that has accumulated through these decades of filmmaking that cannot be matched, something wonderful and magical, and its impact on my life is profound: friends.”

Oscar winners Emma Thompson and Geoffrey Rush paid tribute to Lansbury, with Rush calling her the “living definition of range” and Thompson remembering throwing a pie at the legend while making the 2005 film “Nanny McPhee.”

“What an 11 o’clock number,” said the 88-year-old Lansbury, embracing her Oscar.

Tosi did not attend the event. Actress Claudia Cardinale, who worked with the famed Italian designer on 10 films, including “The Leopard” and “Rocco and His Brothers,” accepted in his honor and saluted the other designers attending the event.