Coco here, ready to talk about the current Oscar race and those crazy SAG awards in particular.
As you already know, the Screen Actors Guild decided to honor the best acting of 2015 in the most bizarre way possible; handing the most nominations to blacklist Hollywood drama Trumbo, and nominating a number of performances whose inclusion range from surprising to outright insane. Don't worry, I'm not here to defend SAG's ridiculous choices. I'm here to do what The Film Experience is best at this time of year: speculating about Oscar nominations. See, the other day I saw someone on Twitter say he'd be surprised if any of this year's SAG categories are repeated 5-for-5 at the Oscars. This comment got me thinking...
Although the amount of correlation between SAG and Oscar has gone down a bit in the last couple years, the math still says that at least one of Oscar's acting categories will look identical to SAG's. The question I'm here to answer is: which one?
Lots of awards spaculation after the jump.
Sorry for the gruesome image, but he might get nominated(!?)
Best Lead Actor
(Cranston "Trumbo", Depp "Black Mass", DiCaprio "The Revenant", Fassbender "Steve Jobs", Redmayne "The Danish Girl")
There are quite a few ways to argue that at least one of these gentlemen could fall out of the race by the time Oscar nominations arrive on the 14th. Black Mass hasn't gotten any significant nominations anywhere else, while The Danish Girl is losing buzz and Redmayne seems more and more like he's coasting to a nomination. The biggest reason to bet against this line-up, however, is not coming from within.
The Martian is shaping up to be one of this year's front-runners, which makes Matt Damon's nomination all the more probable. The one thing working against him is that his biggest publicity moment -when he inevitably wins the Golden Globe - will come right after Oscar voting closes, so he won't get to benefit from it.
Mirren won 3 SAG nominations. Can she inexplicably manage 2 Oscar nominations?
Best Lead Actress
(Blanchett "Carol", Larson "Room", Mirren "Woman in Gold", Ronan "Brooklyn", Silverman "I Smile Back")
This is surely the least likely category to repeat at the Oscars, not in small part because it's the one with the weirdest choices. Helen Mirren for Woman in Gold will go down in history as the quintessential example of SAG-voting laziness. Meanwhile, it would be kind of cool to see Sarah Silverman Oscar nominated for I Smile Back, but does she really have a prayer when not even Jennifer Aniston's buzztrain could get to the station?
We also have Charotte Rampling, Jennifer Lawrence, and depending on how Oscar voters feel about category fraud, either Rooney Mara or Alicia Vikander waiting in the wings. This is the last time we'll see this line-up.
Best Supporting Actor
(Bale "The Big Short", Elba "Beasts of No Nation", Rylance "Bridge of Spies", Shannon "99 Homes", Tremblay "Room")
Similarly to Lead Actor, the problem here is not who is weak within the category, but who is strong without. Sylvester Stallone is a current favorite to win the Supporting Actor Oscar for Creed, and he has the Golden Globe nomination to support this theory. For Sly to make it in, however, one of these five has to be left out. Right now it's easy to imagine any of them (except maybe Rylance) getting the shaft on nomination morning.
Beasts of No Nation doesn't seem to have much traction outside of this category. Michael Shannon has appeared in the right places, but have enough voters seen the film? Tremblay is quite adorable, but he has the problem of being a small boy (and maybe even a few "he's the lead" abstaining fans). Bale seemed like a bizarre choice at the time nominations were announced, but The Big Short has been gathering momentum ever since. With Golden Globe nominated Paul Dano and the guys from Spotlight still trying to get a nomination, there is plenty of room for major shakeups in this category.
How we hope Academy voters will feel about the SAG nominations
Best Supporting Actress
(Mara "Carol", McAdams "Spotlight", Mirren "Trumbo", Vikander "Danish Girl", Winslet "Steve Jobs")
And so we come to this -- the likeliest category to repeat exactly on Oscar nomination morning. And even then, it's so far from being a done deal. The biggest question, of course, is whether Oscar voters will listen to the complaints (not just at The Film Experience for once!) that Rooney Mara and Alicia Vikander are the leads of their films. This is a question that won't be close to being answered until nomination morning, but if we assume that voters will put them in supporting, this exact line-up is wholly possible.
Arguing against it are Jane Fonda, who got a Globe nomination and has the advantage of being Hollywood royalty and an awesome campaigner; Jennifer Jason Leigh, who is also Globe nominated and has goodwill from Anomalisa too; Alicia Vikander, who is competing against herself, and getting lots of critics awards for Ex Machina; and Joan Allen, a beloved actress waiting to get some traction off of Room's buzz in other categories.
Supporting Actress is most likely to transfer to the Oscars, followed by Actor, Supporitng Actor, and Actress in that order. Although, statistics be damned, the most likely scenario seems to be none of these shortlists remaining fully intact on Oscar nomination morning.
Do you agre or do you think 1 (or *shudder* more) of these categories will go 5-for-5 with Oscar?