The Best Actress Oscar nominees are all in a Best Picture nominee for the first time in 47 years
For the first time in 47 years, all five Best Actress Oscar nominees hail from Best Picture nominees.
The Best Actress lineup was the top five in the odds: Cynthia Erivo (Wicked), Karla Sofía Gascón (Emilia Pérez), Mikey Madison (Anora), Demi Moore (The Substance), and Fernanda Torres (I’m Still Here). Four of those films were widely predicted to score Best Picture nominations except for I’m Still Here, which was in 13th place in the odds; but in the biggest surprise of the day, the Brazilian feature made the cut on Thursday. The other Best Picture nominees are The Brutalist, A Complete Unknown, Conclave, Dune: Part Two, and Nickel Boys.
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The last time the Best Actress and Best Picture lineups aligned was during the 1977-78 season when Diane Keaton (Annie Hall) won Best Actress over Jane Fonda (Julia), Marsha Mason (The Goodbye Girl), and The Turning Point stars Anne Bancroft and Shirley MacLaine. Back then, Best Picture had a field of five (Star Wars was the fifth Best Picture nominee), so that was arguably a more impressive match than now when there are 10 Best Picture nominees. The Turning Point producing double nominees also means the Best Actress nominees didn’t represent five different films. The Herbert Ross drama, which went 0-for-11, is one of five films to score multiple Best Actress nominations.
The Best Actress-Best Picture pairing has occurred three other times in Oscar history, in the film years 1934, 1939 and 1940, but the 1934 one comes with an asterisk. There were 12 Best Picture nominees at the time and only three Best Actress nominees: winner Claudette Colbert (It Happened One Night), Grace Moore (One Night of Love), and Norma Shearer (The Barretts of Wimpole Street). Following outrage over Bette Davis‘ snub for Of Human Bondage, the Academy allowed write-in votes for her but does not recognize it as an official nomination. But it’s a moot point since Of Human Bondage was not nominated for Best Picture.
SEE Full list of Oscar nominations
Like nowadays, 1939 and 1940 had fields of five in Best Actress and fields of 10 in Best Picture. In the former year, Vivien Leigh (Gone With the Wind) beat Davis (Dark Victory), Irene Dunne (Love Affair), Greta Garbo (Ninotchka), and Greer Garson (Goodbye, Mr. Chips) to claim her first of two Best Actress statuettes. The Best Actress class of 1940 saw Ginger Rogers (Kitty Foyle) defeat Davis (The Letter), Joan Fontaine (Rebecca), Katharine Hepburn (The Philadelphia Story), and Martha Scott (Our Town).
This overlap has come close to transpiring twice in the last decade. Seven years ago, the Best Actress race featured Frances McDormand (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri), who won, Sally Hawkins (The Shape of Water), Saoirse Ronan (Lady Bird), Margot Robbie (I, Tonya), and Meryl Streep (The Post). All hailed from Best Picture nominees save for Robbie. At the time, the Oscars used the sliding scale, in which Best Picture could have anywhere between five and 10 nominees, before returning to a set field of 10 three years ago. That year had nine Best Picture nominees. Perhaps I, Tonya, which won Best Supporting Actress for Allison Janney, would’ve been the 10th one under current rules.
Robbie found herself in the opposite situation last year. While Barbie made Best Picture, she was excluded from the Best Actress final five. Annette Bening, who was seventh in the odds, two spots below Robbie, cracked the lineup for Nyad alongside Lily Gladstone (Killers of the Flower Moon), Sandra Hüller (Anatomy of a Fall), Carey Mulligan (Maestro), and eventual winner Emma Stone (Poor Things). Nyad was the sole non-Best Picture nominee.
SEE Fernanda Torres and Isabella Rossellini join their moms as Oscar acting nominees
It is, of course, common for Best Actress nominees not to come from Best Picture nominees since most Best Picture contenders are male-led. Two years ago, Blonde‘s Ana de Armas and To Leslie‘s Andrea Riseborough were lone nominees for their films. Three years ago, in one of the most chaotic Best Actress races in recent history, none of the Best Actress nominees were in a Best Picture nominee for the first time in 16 years.
Torres quickly ascended into the top five in the odds following her Best Drama Actress Golden Globe victory earlier this month, but I’m Still Here, which also received an expected Best International Film nomination, did not surge up the ranks in the Best Picture odds at the same rate. It was also snubbed last week by the Producers Guild of America Awards, which typically does not nominate a ton of international fare anyway. Last year’s Anatomy of a Fall and The Zone of Interest bids at PGA were an anomaly, as was PGA matching the Oscar lineup 10/10 for the first time in the preferential era. But I’m Still Here has one of the best studio campaigners in the game, Sony Pictures Classics, behind it, and combined with the visibility of Torres’ Globe win, I’m Still Here helped end a 47-year dry spell. Let’s hope the next drought doesn’t last as long.
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