Monday
Feb102020
New Oscar trivia from the Hollywoods big night
Monday, February 10, 2020 at 11:05AM by Nathaniel R
A FEW FIRSTS!
- Laura Dern became the first person in her highly acclaimed family to win the Oscar and is now (3/1) in her nomination/win stats. Her mother Diane Ladd (3/0) and father Bruce Dern (2/0), who she name checked as her heroes in her speech have never won.
- Parasite became the first South Korean film to win ANY Oscars and it won 4 of them. The individual wins from Bong Joon Ho, Kwak Sin-ae, and Han Jin Won are the first times any Asian has won Best Picture or a writing category...
- Karen Rupert Toliver is the first black woman to win the Best Animated Short category (shared with Matthew A Cherry who is the second black man to win this category after Kobe Bryant) .
- Taiki Waititi became the first Maori artist to win any Oscar
- Joaquin Phoenix became the first member of his acting family to win the Oscar (on his 4th nomination). His late older brother River was nominated once in Supporting Actor before his tragic death. His sisters Rain and Summer both act as well.
- Hildur Gudnadottir is the first woman to win Best Original Score by herself or in a year with just one Original Score category (previous winners were co-writers or won while the category was split into two briefly for comic or dramatic scores).
- Parasite is the first foreign-language film to win the most Oscar in its film year (with 4).
IT'S HAPPENED BEFORE BUT IT'S STILL COOL OR INTERESTING
- Toy Story 4 is the first fourth movie in a series to win an Oscar since (the only other one) Thunderball (1965). It's also only the second time a film series has won the two top awards in its category (following Toy Story 3's win. (The only other instance is The Godfather Part II's Best Picture win)
- Brad Pitt follows in the footsteps of... Michael Douglas? They both won their first Oscars producing (12 Years a Slave / One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest) before eventually winning for their acting (Once Upon a Time in Hollywood / Wall Street). The chief difference is that Michael Douglas won his producing award before he was a movie star (he was a TV star at the time) and Pitt had long since been a headliner at the movies.
- This is the second consecutive year that a Nordic composer has won Original Score (and before that there had been none who ever had) and both one for comic book films. Sweden's Ludwig Goransson won for Black Panther last year and Iceland's Hildur Gudnadottir for Joker this year.
- Parasite ties Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (2000) and Fanny & Alexander (1983) records for most wins from a foreign-language film though neither of those films won Best Picture.
- The Irishman is the second movie by Martin Scorsese to be nominated for 10 Oscars and lose every single category. That also happened with Gangs of New York (2002). In both years it was the only Best Picture nominee to go home Oscarless.
- Joker is the only comic book character to ever lead to an Oscar win and it's happened twice now, first with Heath Ledger (2008) and now with Joaquin Phoenix.
- Bong Joon Ho is the second Asian man to win Best Director. The first and only other is Ang Lee (who has won it twice).
- Kazu Hiro had previously won the Makeup Oscar for Darkest Hour. He's now a two timer winner due to Bombshell. He's also the only Asian ever nominated in the category (four nominations now)
- Jane Fonda is the 15th woman to present Best Picture solo. The only previous instances are Ethel Barrymore (1948), Mary Pickford (1952), Audrey Hepburn (1955, 1960, 1966, and 1975), Janet Gaynor (1956), Ingrid Bergman (1958), Olivia de Havilland (1962), Julie Andrews (1967), Elizabeth Taylor (1969 and 1973), Lillian Gish (1980), Loretta Young (1981), Carol Burnett (1982), Cher (1988), Barbra Streisand (1990), and Julia Roberts (2018).
ALSO OF NOTE
- Thomas Newman (1917) is now the most nominated film composer to never have won the Original Score Oscar. He previously was tied for that record with Alex North (Under the Volcano) who had 14 nominations in that category but now Newman holds the record alone with 15.
- The new normal: This decade had 5 splits between Picture and Director and 5 instances of the prizes going to the same film. It's a 50% reality now when Picture/Director splits were uncommon up until the 21st century.
how often picture and director matched
1920s 0/2
1930s 5/10
1940s 7/10
1950s 7/10
1960s 9/10
1970s 9/10
1980s 8/10
1990s 9/10
2000s 7/10
2010s 5/10 - The new normal part 2: Sweeps are also passe. No Best Picture winner this decade won more than 5 Oscars.
- There is still no Oscar for best stunts but now there is an Oscar winning performance where the role is a stuntman (Brad Pitt). Ryan Gosling was of course not nominated for Drive and Peter O'Toole was not the titular character in The Stuntman (1980) though he was nominated for that film.
Can you think of any other cool new trivia?
more 92nd Academy Awards coverage
top five presenters or duos
embroidered fashion statements (literally)
the winner and immediate afterthoughts
Reader Comments (63)
I read somewhere that Bong Joon Ho tied Walt Disney for most individual Oscar wins in a single year with 4. Not sure if it is correct, but cool if it is true!
PoliVamp I think technically the best international film award goes to the country and not the individual director so I don't think that win 'counts' as his, which I always find odd.
First mention of animal insemination in an acceptance speech, thanks to Joaquin Phoenix? (Please tell me that you are going to address this on the blog!)
Is the second time the Palme d'Or winner has also won Best Picture. The first was "Marty" in 1955.
With Joaquin winning, The Joker joins Vito Corleone as the only character to win acting Oscars for two separate movies
That was a great Oscar moment with Laura Dern. She has two parents who have been under-awarded by Hollywood and it's wonderful they're still alive to see her win it.
I believe Janelle's affirmation of her queerness is the earliest point in an Oscars ceremony that the word has ever been uttered. (In fact, it may be the only time someone has said the word "queer" on an Oscars stage. Can anyone confirm?)
If Queen Latifah ever wins an acting Oscar and surely the starlets in the supporting category this year will at least win once -- Kathy Bates will have three of her four nomination categories with all winners.
It's the 5th time an acting double-nominee loses both Oscars - it happened last night to ScarJo and it has happened before to Weaver, Thompson, Moore and Blanchett.
.
Also, it's the 8th time Oscar for Best Director and the DGA Award have differed.
- Apparently, Diane Warren is the most Oscar-nominated woman without a win in any category.
- With 4 wins, I do believe "Parasite" is the first foreign-language film to win the most Oscars of the night. ("Fanny & Alexander" and "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" also won 4 but they didn't the most in their respective years).
What did Janelle mean by saying she's "queer?" Is she bisexual or what?
Both African American male winners in Best Animated Short were also professional athletes. Kobe was the first, and Cherry is a former NFL player.
I'm surprised to learn Meryl Streep has never presented Best Picture solo.
@PoliVamp technically Best International Feature is not awarded to any specific individual but to the submiting country although it is usually accepted by the director.
@ Mark F.
She sleeps with women, she's queer. (What she does with men, I have no idea.)
I kind of want to count International just so he does tie, lol
It's the first time that the top 4 acting winners don't have a group photo
'It's the first time that the top 4 acting winners don't have a group photo' how weird, why didn't it happen ?
Brad Pitt has now also won the same Oscars as his pal George Clooney, though George got his acting Oscar first!
@Mark F. & Working stiff: Janelle has said before that she identifies with both pan and bisexuality, and she also came out as non-binary.
The decade of 2010's was totally dominated for foreign director winners, just 1 of the 10 is american and half of them are mexican.
I'm not sure but I could bet is the decade with most foreign director winners.
Is Renée Zellweger the first person to win an Oscar for playing an Oscar winner's parent?
the show was not particularly good... winners were all expected .. Zellweger us really
a piece od work.. She gave a s acceptance speech with w Southern drawl at GG and last night
she lost her accent and just rambled on..
American film making needs to wake ups. Hopefully the Parasite win will help.
We do ACTION and REMAKES!!!!
Joaquin Phoenix is the 2nd cast member of "I'm Still Here" to win a Best Actor Oscar.
@ thefilmjunkie
In a word, "queer."
;-)
@ Guestguestguest
The four stars of Quills are now all Oscar winners.
Zellweger joins De Niro, Streep, Lange, Washington, and Blanchett as the only actors to win Lead Oscars after first winning in Supporting.
Zellweger has two and Glenn Close has zero.
Shit, it’s rainin’
Jack Lemmon too for actors who got the Leading Oscar after the Supporting win.
All the principals from The Master have Oscars except its writer-director and Amy Adams.
Crazy decade... no Best Picture winner won more than five Oscars! That's a first. The days of sweeps seem to be over.
is this the 1st year where 2 people in the same acting catergory were not present ? (Hopkins and Pesci)
Also... only ONE Best Picture winner this decade also won Best Editing ("Argo"). That's a first, too, I believe.
Technically, Thomas Newman is still tied at 14 as the most-losing original score composer -- one of his 15 total noms was for original song for WALL-E.
Tyler: Kevin Spacey won lead after winning supporting too.
DAVID: No, it's happened a fair few times. Check out some of the YouTube clips of acting categories from.the 1970s, for example. Attendance was sometimes quite poor, surprisingly!
Saw elsewhere: Both movies Roger Deakins won cinematography for had numbers in their titles: "Blade Runner 2019" and "1917."
(or year dates, rather)
Is Parasite really the first foreign language film to win Best Picture? I recall reading a lot of subtitles in "the Artist". I believe Parasite is the first SPOKEN foreign language film to wear Best Picture.
Phoenx and Zellweger both won lead Oscars for roles that were played better by somebody else who also won awards--Heath Ledger and Judy Davis
"In Memorium" deservedly included Catherine Burns (Oscar nominee for "Last Summer" - 1969) but inexplicably overlooked Michael J. Pollard (Oscar nominee for "Bonnie and Clyde" - 1967). Why?
"The Irishman is the second movie by Martin Scorsese to be nominated for 10 Oscars and lose every single category. That also happened with Gangs of New York (2002). In both years it was the only Best Picture nominee to go home Oscarless."
Oddly, in both years telecast 8 Mile's song were performed.
This is obscure but Renee's win extends the lead of the 2002 Oscar year's acting nominees for most total career Oscar wins, now two ahead of any other year (22 vs 20 for 1951 and now also 2001 when Renee was also nominated).
2002 was such a remarkable slate of acting noms - Adrien Brody beating previous winners Jack, DDL, Caine, Cage for Actor, Kidman over Renee and Julianne Moore in Actress, Newman and Walken in Supporting Actor, Meryl, Julianne Moore, and Bates in Supporting actress. Only five nominated actors who have never won (Diane Lane, Salma Hayek, Ed Harris, John C Reilly, Queen Latifah).
Separately, the four actors currently under 55 with 2 acting Oscars:
Cate Blanchett
Hilary Swank
Mahershala Ali
Renee Zellweger
Odd list... don't think it's any slight to the others to say Cate is the only one whose career seems like it belongs with Jack, Meryl, Sean Penn, Denzel, Hanks, etc. So far at least.
Pete -- i love Obscure trivia. well done!
Renee is only the 3rd actress to win lead actress in her 50s, following Shirley Booth & Julianne Moore... the lowest decade in terms of wins for adult actresses 20 to 69. No actress has won lead under 20, 7 have in their 60s (all 60-63) with 4 of these already winning lead previously, so big established stars. K Hepburn won her 4th aged 74 & J Tandy 80.
Renee is the only actress to win lead in her 50s after a previous win.
Joachin probably did something unique but not sure what exactly. Perhaps the only person to win a lead actor oscar after an older oscar nominated rising star sibling died young.
@John: Well, at least Close lost her last one to a really good performance and a great actress in Coleman. Imagine the horror of watching Zellweger sweep past her this year.
Whunk - I thought Renee was terrific and would have probably beat Olivia. Glenn should win next year if Sunset Boulevard is ready. If not, they must give her an honorary oscar. FFS Jackie Chsn has an oscar and Glenn has none.
Chatan: The 8 Mile song wasn't performed at the 2002 ceremony. But it won anyway!
Now that we've had the last ceremony of the 2010s, I've been thinking back across the last ten years and how they compare with previous decades - in particular in the Best picture category.
A few things are striking: as others have noted in recent times, this decade has seen a lot of Picture/Directing splits - 5 out of the 10 films. This is the most since the 1930s (5 also). The intervening decades were as follows:
1940s: 3
1950s: 3
1960s: 1
1970s: 1
19802: 2
1990s: 1
2000s: 3
I've only gone back to the 1970s for the rest of my stats today, but here goes:
In terms of total wins, this decade's Best Pictures tended to win far fewer Oscars than the winners from previous decades. Total Oscar wins for Best Picture winners:
1970s: 50
1980s: 57
1990s: 66
2000s: 55
2010s: 35
Writing wins, however, are on a par with previous decades:
1970s: 8
1980s: 9
1990s: 6
2000s: 7
2010s: 8
But the biggest discrepancy between this decade and previous decades re: Best Picture winners is in the number of Oscars they won in the technical categories (which I count as everything outside of Picture, Directing, International Feature Film, the acting awards and the writing awards):
1970s: 13
1980s: 23
1990s: 33
2000s: 25
2010s: 6
So, the past ten Best Picture winners haven't received many technical Oscars. Whereas Hugo, Gravity and Mad Max: Fury Road have 17 technical Oscars between them.
Just a few observations!
Is Laura Dern the first acting winner with both parents past acting nominees?
Parasite joins a short list of BP winners in the 'crime-thriller' genre - (one of) the least likely genres to produce a best picture - Other are
The Departed
No Country for Old Men
The Silence of the Lambs
Godfather 1 & 2
The French Connection
In the Heat of the Night
On the Waterfront
Anything else?
@ Matty
Yes.
And the Redgrave sisters in '66 were the first nominated children of a previous nominee.
@ Ellsworth
If The Godfather and On the Waterfront count as "crime-thrillers"
then so do Rebecca and The Sting...