Oscar Nominations Voting Begins This Week

The academy returned this year’s best cast slate to a fixed 10 nominees, Nearly a dozen contenders are competing for the final few spots, and there’s no clear front-runner in sight. Here’s the lay of the land as members prepare to cast their ballots.

It felt almost like old times this morning even as Leslie Jordan and Tracee Ellis Ross led the virtual announcement of the nominations for the 94th annual Academy Awards.

For King Richard’s Will Smith and Aunjanue Ellis, Being the Ricardos’ Javier Bardem and Nicole Kidman and respective The Power of the Dog and Drive My Car directors Jane Campion and Ryusuke Hamaguchi, it was another step forward in a near true Hollywood story as contenders for the big prizes on March 27 on ABC as the Oscars return to the Dolby Theatre. However, for the locked-out likes of Passing’s Ruth Negga and House of Gucci’s Lady Gaga, it’ll probably take more than a couple of cups of coffee to make them want to get out of bed with a spring in their step this February AM. 

Best 10 Cast Oscar nominations voting begins this week, with the results to be revealed on Feb. 8.

1. Lady Gaga – House of Gucci’s big push focused on its leading lady. However, the past Oscar, BAFTA and Grammy winner was left out in high fashion this morning. In its favor: Big-budget, big-swing, true-crime tabloid story is shameless, audacious, campy, operatic and self-consciously over-the-top. It’s so fun and frothy!

2. Ruth Negga – The Passing star looked a lock for a Best Supporting Actress category, but the former nominee was distinctly passed over Tuesday.

3. Leonardo DiCaprio – Despite a sincere effort, the previous Oscar winner just couldn’t get Oscar voters to take a real look at his work in satire Don’t Look Up.

4. Caitriona Balfe – The Belfast matriarch was considered the closest thing to a sure thing this awards season. Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences members spurned that conventional wisdom.

5. Sing 2 – Adding Bono to the mix with the vocal talents of Matthew McConaughey, Reese Witherspoon and Scarlett Johansson still left the animated Universal sequel silent.

6. Denis Villeneuve – Dune got a Best Picture nomination and nine more today, yet the acclaimed director of the epic based on Frank Herbert’s sprawling classic was sandbagged.

7. Rita Moreno – Lots of love for Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story, but the historic opportunity of a new nomination for the EGOT star of the 1961 original and the 2021 version didn’t even get air kisses.

8. Mahershala Ali – Even though he played two characters often on-screen at the same time in Swan Song, the two-time Oscar winner’s first feature leading-man role in Apple TV+’s sci-fi drama just didn’t hit the right notes to get the votes.

9. Frances McDormand – The icon played Lady Macbeth! Still, one year after snagging another Oscar for Nomadland, the Tragedy of Macbeth actress was nowhere to be found this morning.

10. Aaron Sorkin – Both of his Being the Ricardos leads were deservingly blessed with nominations, so why was the scribe denied another shot at Original Screenplay?