The Oscars for Best Actress and Supporting Actress Are Still Up for Grabs

Want the inside scoop on all things awards? Welcome to Letter From the Awards Editor, our series in which Backstage’s Jack Smart takes a look at the latest film and television news, industry trends, and awards projections that matter to today’s working actor.

Dear Backstage reader,

Let’s agree on a generalized truth: The last year has been so many different shades of weird. And the vast majority of that weirdness, not in a good way.

But recently, as we’ve passed the one-year anniversary of lockdown, and as vaccines are rolling out at a faster rate than even the most optimistic predicted, it’s occurred to me that not all of COVID-19’s unprecedented effects on our lives are worth reversing post-pandemic. It’s the thinnest of silver linings, I know, but you’ll forgive someone with an “awards editor” title for this takeaway: future film and guild awards seasons could stand to benefit from this historically weird one.

Take last weekend’s 27th annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. After the Emmys, BAFTA TV Awards, and Golden Globes attempted hybridized ceremonies of stage presentations and live webcams, to, let’s say, varying levels of success, SAG-AFTRA hedged their bets on an entirely pre-taped option. Category nominees joined remotely while glamorous presenters filmed charming segments—some covering Backstage-friendly topics like Zoom auditions and dubious résumé skills!—and the format helped a charming sense of camaraderie, despite the inability to celebrate in person, prevail.

And it all, wondrously, took place in exactly one hour. Life is short, and as these SAG Awards proved, an awards ceremony can keep up the pace of announcing results while retaining some of the extraneous fluff that makes for fun TV. (Granted, it helps that SAG only has 15 categories. But the fewer garbage fire stunts at the 2021 Emmys, the better!)

Furthermore, it was the 2021 SAG results that got me thinking the pandemic has shaken things up in a not-unwelcome way. The Oscars’ delay all the way to late April has meant a season at complete odds with last year’s rapid barrage of awards results; with almost no overlap between different awards bodies’ nominating and voting windows, voters clearly have more time to consider and even reconsider their choices. Last year’s four film acting Academy winners, Joaquin Phoenix, Renée Zellweger, Brad Pitt, and Laura Dern, earned their preceding Golden Globe, Critics’ Choice, and SAG Award, all within mere weeks of each other. This year, it’s a thrillingly different story.

Just look at the leading actress race! None of those precursor prizes have gone to the same Oscar nominee: Andra Day of “The United States vs Billie Holiday” took the Golden Globe for motion picture drama (Rosamund Pike of “I Care A Lot” also won a Globe, but did not make the cut with Oscar), Carey Mulligan of “Promising Young Woman” earned the coveted Critics’ Choice honor, and Viola Davis of “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” won a whopping sixth SAG Award, also making history as the first Black actress to win the leading film prize twice.

Even wilder: the Oscar category’s two other nominees, Frances McDormand of “Nomadland” and Vanessa Kirby of “Pieces of a Woman,” are the only ones in the running at the British Academy Film Awards to be presented this weekend. Imagine if Kirby wins there, and McDormand takes home the Film Independent Spirit Award! We’d enter Oscar night with each of the five contenders having one major accolade under her belt, making it truly anyone’s game. The supporting actress race is similarly undecided, with Maria Bakalova of “Borat Subsequent Moviefilm” earning the Critics’ Choice and Youn Yuh-Jung of “Minari” taking SAG.

Which do you prefer, dear reader—spreading the Oscar precursor wealth? Or the clean sweeps we’ve seen so often in recent years? I obviously prefer the former, if only because it spices things up and pushes back on the notion of a quantifiably predictable awards season. But I suppose it depends on your opinion of the performances in question. (Bias alert: I would not have voted for any of last year’s acting frontrunners, but either way, I’d prefer a variety of contenders giving acceptance speeches!)

Plus, think of it from a nominee’s perspective. If you win the Oscar after having earned the Globe, Critics’ Choice, SAG, and BAFTA prizes, isn’t that a tad anticlimactic? Better to have one or even none of those prizes when your name is called; Denzel Washington’s 2002 Oscar win for “Training Day,” after no major precursors, is the biggest example of such a surprise. I’m not encouraging Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences members to pick a shocking winner for shock value...but it certainly makes for a more enticing ceremony when victories aren’t foregone conclusions.

There’s also COVID-19’s impact on Hollywood’s ongoing identity crisis, from the consolidation of major distributors and streaming services’ reign to an industry-wide reckoning of racism, sexism, and other forms of bias. I’m very curious to see how this Sunday’s BAFTA Film Awards play out, after a diversification of voters and overhaul of their voting processes resulted in a strikingly more varied nominees list. It feels like two steps forward in recognizing art that reflects a diverse audience—will there inevitably be one step back?

All of these factors and more have turned an elongated awards season into a continually unexpected one. While the industry always evolves in fits and starts year after year, it’s been fascinating to stand at such a seismic crossroads, with the Hollywood of before crumbling to make way for the Hollywood of after. Stay tuned here for the season’s final stretch!

Sincerely,

Jack

• To get a further sense of the 2021 Oscar race, and in fact the 2021 Emmy race, look to the recently unveiled Writers Guild Awards and Producers Guild Awards. The directors will weigh in tomorrow.
• In other recent awards news, here are your guides to this year’s Oscar nominees for animated feature film and international feature film. And don’t miss Oscar-nominated actors sharing insights into their creative processes: “Judas and the Black Messiah” SAG winner Daniel Kaluuya and “The United States vs. Billie Holiday” Globe winner Andra Day joined our “In the Envelope” podcast, while “Sound of Metal” Gotham Award winner Riz Ahmed graced the cover of our indie film issue.