Oscar Volley: Can anyone beat Frankie in "Best Production Design"?
Friday, February 20, 2026 at 5:30PM More Oscar Volleys are upon us. Today, ERIC BLUME and BEN MILLER discuss the Oscar race for Best Production Design...
ONE BATTLE AFTER ANOTHER's Florencia Martin and Anthony Carlino are just happy to be nominated. They have non chance of winning.
ERIC: Hi Ben, let's take a look at our five nominated films for the Best Production Design Oscar: Frankenstein, Hamnet, Marty Supreme, One Battle After Another, and Sinners. Maybe just for funsies, we can go backwards. What are the two films that you think stand the smallest chance of winning this award?
BEN: Frankly, there aren't many categories where One Battle After Another stands very little chance, but I think we have finally arrived at one...
Of the crafts the film excels at, this is the one with the least flashy work. The Oscars, and especially the Production Design branch, love maximalism. That's not to say the work isn't awesome, it's just not what they usually care about. The same goes for Hamnet. That playhouse, as well as the Shakespeare household, are wonders to behold, but it's too understated. There aren't preposterous door knockers or expertly set up juke joints. If you look back at the Production Design Oscar history, the smallest winner was La La Land, and even that was pretty large-scale. I would also put Marty Supreme in the same boat as OBAA and Hamnet. Too understated, despite it being my personal winner.
I'm feeling feisty, and I'll be honest with you: I can't stand Frankenstein's Production Design. It's a bigger problem I have with the movie as a whole. There is so much about it that indulges in faux atmosphere and setting without focusing on anything the text should actually be focusing on. It's big, and impressive, and has zero subtlety. Tell me I'm wrong, and do you like what they are doing?
ERIC: Agreed that OBAA is a true surprise nominee, and it's cool that they acknowledged the care and detail of both the French 75 sequences set in the past and the DiCaprio home interiors, dojo setups, and whatnot in the present. I wish we saw more contemporary and "non-stylized" work like this recognized year after year after year.
Fiona Crombie and Alice Felton reconstructed The Globe for HAMNET.
And agreed that Hamnet is probably in fourth place, despite really superb work to place you in the year 1600(ish), allowing Chloé Zhao to do her Carl Theodor Dreyer stately framing. That recreation of the theater is truly splendid, and all the decisions towards sparseness throughout are so thoughtful and unflashy that I think it may be the best work in the category.
And Ben, the sets of La La Land are IMMENSE! That final musical sequence is so stunningly realized! (I will welcome any opportunity to extoll the virtues of the masterpiece that is La La Land.)
The production design in Marty Supreme was my favorite element of a film I really hated. Jack Fisk has been doing this for over 50 years, and it's insane that he doesn't have an Oscar for it yet. That bowling alley alone was beyond perfect. He's such a master of detail, and he does everything so lovingly. I would adore seeing him win, despite my extreme distaste for the picture itself. But voters do not give career awards in this category.
So, I guess our focus is on Sinners versus Frankenstein, though I don't think it's much of a battle for the victory, which is going to Frankenstein for sure. So let's get into it. I love the production design of Frankenstein exactly because there is no subtlety. It's a monster movie! I don't want subtle in my monster movies (and I'd argue Jacob Elordi brings the subtlety).
As designed by Tamara Deverell and Shane Vieau, FRANKENSTEIN's lab screams at the horror of his creations.
To cite a specific example, let's start with the doctor's laboratory. So you're the del Toro team, you're remaking Frankenstein for the umpteenth time, and viewers know the story, have seen this laboratory constructed many times, so there are both expectations you must deliver on as well as traps you must avoid. I thought the design team found the right idea there: that sequence has to feel enormous, right? It's *the* moment of the movie, and that set piece needs to be colossal. To me, they constructed a world that feels both in-period and out-of-period at the same time, which is kind of the movie's overall visual sensibility. I know a lot of people feel very strongly about hating the visual elements, but I think the decision to go "huge and Gothic" was thrillingly executed.
Give me some specific examples of elements or sets or moments in the film that drive your dissatisfaction.
BEN: I guess it's just an aspect of maximalism without fully committing to the bit. You have these ridiculously huge energy orbs in the lab, with all the crazy-faced wall adornments, only for Victor himself to be a big dullard. This is not a problem with the Production Design itself, but a larger issue I have with the film. I don't get how you can take such specific care with the visual aspects of this story without giving equal care to the rest of it. But, as I said, this is not a knock on the Production Design or Tamara Deverell. I need to separate the film as a whole from the filmmaker’s individual achievement. She did exactly what del Toro wanted her to do, and she delivered in spades.
I guess I am more annoyed at how this category shakes out. Is it the MOST, or is it the BEST? That's the case in many categories, not just this one, of course. I think Sinners would be an incredible winner, mostly because it isn't about those massive gothic figures and chances to shine. Instead, you have to craft the structure of a juke joint, which serves the great majority of the plot. I think that's a lot harder than just making things look creepy.
In SINNERS, Hannah Beachler and Monique Champagne brought the Mississippi Delta of 1932 back to life. This church was built from scratch on the grounds of a Louisiana plantation.
Here's my question to you: what do you want out of this category?
ERIC: Well, sadly, I think many Oscar categories equivocate to MOST rather than BEST. That's traditionally true of this category, the costume race, and sadly, sometimes, the acting ones! To your point, while I'm well on record here stating that Sinners is an absurdly overrated movie, I think if the Oscars were being handed out to location scouts, it would be a worthy winner. The movie makes the most of these expertly found and smartly chosen locations, which lend to the sweaty, soupy, everything-but-the-kitchen-sink style of it. But within those locations, I don't see anything in the production design that is particularly artful. It's certainly adequately managed by that art team, but not in any way that any superb art team would render it. It's professionally and smartly designed, but in my opinion, not anywhere near an Oscar nomination or win.
I feel this list of five is one of the weakest slates of nominees we've had in this category in many years. The craftspeople like to nominate films that are either very "big" in their world-building (elaborate sets that really bring the director's vision to life), or attention-to-detail work (like the nomination for The Father, which was largely one-set, but the team really packed it with specifics). And this year's overall crop of films didn't have an enormous amount of either of those... so instead we kind of got "default" nominees, which are just the films people liked best this year. The list overall just feels curiously uninspired. Would have been nice to see surprise nominations for something "big" like Kiss of the Spider Woman (which superbly constructs "real" and "fantasy movie" worlds shockingly and effectively separate from one another), or something "attention-to-detail" like the smart work the team in After the Hunt does, capturing the lives of the academic characters with very specific indoor spaces.
So the category is a bit of a dud for me this year, Ben. I do think it comes down to Sinners vs. Frankenstein. My vote between the two is definitely Frankenstein, but as mentioned, I thought it did the most out of these five in terms of world-building. But I know there are people who just hate the look and design of that film. I was in the exact same position with last year's winner, Wicked, which I found one of the ugliest and junkiest and most-designed-to-be-recreated-for-a-theme-park movies I'd ever seen.
So what's your final personal vote and projected winner... and any final thoughts?
Working on limited resources, Jack Fisk and Adam Willis improvised this perfectly period car lot for the last day of shooting in MARTY SUPREME.
BEN: My personal vote would go to Marty Supreme, for all the aforementioned reasons. As you said, that bowling alley scene alone is worthy, but if you add the apartments, the ping pong bar, the dingy hotel, the old house in the country, and the final outdoor exhibition, they are all exemplary work. That would be the coolest win in a long time, but we all know better.
As far as predicting the winner, we all can see Frankenstein walking away with this. It's a lot of substance, and it makes the most of the maximalism on display. Ultimately, it's the kind of winner you expect from this category. And if there is anything Frankenstein probably deserves, it's this win. All in all, it's a pretty underwhelming category in terms of competitiveness. If Sinners actually ends up winning, maybe the Best Picture gas can be amped up a bit. But, I don't see that happening.
ERIC: While I don’t like the idea of Marty Supreme winning anything, it also might be my personal choice, too, mostly because I’d love to see Jack Fisk as an Oscar winner after 50 years of superb work. But second choice for me would be Frankenstein, and I agree that it losing would be a shock.
Thanks for the fun convo, as always! Eager to see viewers’ thoughts in the comments.
If FRANKENSTEIN wins, will it be a case of "most" winning over "best"?
Previous Oscar Volleys:
Reader Comments (3)
While the grouping of five Best Picture nominees feels rather rote and uninspired, I actually think Production Design makes up one of the best quintets this Oscar season. It's only really bested by Supporting Actress, mayhap, Makeup & Hairstyling.
Here's how I'd rank the nominees...
1) HAMNET, for the recreation and the speculation, how spaces echo the characters even while they posit prisons for them. The HAMLET staging is perfectly bizarre, bringing the forest to a tragedy almost exclusively set within the castle of Elsinore, but it serves as Agnes and Will's worlds colliding and, in the limbo, serving as a space that transitions their son from life to death. Re-watching the film for screenshots, I was also impressed by the theatricality of the domestic spaces, prosceniums of different shapes drawn everywhere you look.
2) ONE BATTLE AFTER ANOTHER, for skirting realism in specific places, so as to appeal to a mythic reading of the material or, sometimes, an absurdist lean. Love the lunacy of the Christmas Adventurers' underground lair and the corporate blandness of their official headquarters. Love the stories each domestic interior tells, and the militarization that encroaches on civilian spaces. Love the convent, part derelict, part ghost of some long-forgotten Western.
3) MARTY SUPREME, for the period authenticity in dialogue with a set of directorial references that anachronistically imagines the post-war through a Reaganite lens. Love the controlled chaos of New York Streets and that spindly New Jersey house, perfect for a shadowy shoot-out. And then there's the way capital forces everything into being a product, from that opening scene shoe store to the exhibition match in Japan that doesn't even have the decency to pretend to be anything other than a piece of advertising theater.
4) SINNERS, for more period authenticity, even if in a minor key. Because you guys really undersell what Beachlor did. Indeed, I find Eric's assertion that the film is mostly location work quite telling, as it speaks to the verisimilitude of the sets. And there are so many sets! The juke joint and the church, it echoes in a blasphemous callback, were built from scratch. Annie's house, the white folks dilapidated abode, the family-owned grocery store interiors on both sides of the street yet worlds apart, even the cotton fields that were planted purposefully for the production. Only the train and the street exterior were location buildings redressed for the camera. But even then, isn't that also what led LA LA LAND to a much-deserved Oscar win? Sure, the restaurant and the dream ballet are sets, but most everything else is a Los Angeles skewed ever so slightly into unreality.
5) FRANKENSTEIN, for Deverell tries her best despite being sabotaged, every step of the way, by Dan Laustsen's cinematography and the VFX team's post-production curse. That ship is incredible, even if it looks fake, and the army frozen in place over snowy fields is an even better wintry landscape. The lab is a bit overdone, but those mossy stairs are to die for and I appreciate the use of impossible, slippery curves to make the tower feel uncomfortably organic. Oh, and I love the blind man's cottage, how it manages to feel warm and squalid, full of hiding places for the Creature yet familiar and open in a way the Frankensteins' chateau never is.
But in any case, no film other than RESURRECTION should be winning any Best Production Design awards this season, so I guess there's that against this entire lineup, no matter how strong I find it to be. On the other volleys, the quality of this year's lineups was described as almost accidental and I guess that applies here, too.
Despite Del Toro's strong advocacy for physical production elements, Frankenstein gave the me the strongest vibes of "is this CGI?" of all 5 nominees by a mile
Eric - I rolled my eyes when I read you calling La La Land a masterpiece BUT then you said you didn’t want Marty Supreme to win anything… so I’m torn about you haha ;)
Agreed that some of the categories should be called MOST rather than BEST lol but it would be nice to see Sinners win this over Frankenstein. I know not many like the film on here, and it being the most nominated film ever will definitely keep it in the history books - I just hope there isn’t a backlash (which seems unlikely) and that it does indeed win more than a couple come Oscar night. Honestly I feel a backlash coming for OBAA….but maybe that is just my wishful thinking haha