I had to check the SAG rules for eligibility after watching this morning’s rather jaw-dropping nominations for the newly renamed Actor Awards Presented by SAG-AFTRA. Did the guild, in addition to changing its awards show name, suddenly also make foreign-language films and performances ineligible and I just didn’t notice?
Well, no. This is the same guild that awarded its marquee Outstanding Cast prize to South Korea’s Parasite in 2019 and as recently as last year showered love and nominations on the likes of Emilia Pérez and started the ball rolling for Russian actor Yura Borisov. The rules haven’t changed, but in a year where such international triumphs as Sentimental Value, The Secret Agent, No Other Choice and It Was Just an Accident, to name a few, are considered major Oscar contenders, and the complete shutout — snub, if you want to call it that — of actors in these films is stunning. And judging from the stream of phone calls and texts I am getting, the town is pretty shocked as well.
You have heard the phrase in this Trump era, “America First” — welcome to the nominees for the 31st annual Actor Awards.
Jacob Elordi as The Creature in ‘Frankenstein‘
Ken Woroner/Netflix
That said, in a very competitive year with a lot of great performances, the 2,500-strong randomly chosen SAG Nominating Committee did a good job of recognizing some outstanding performances. But I will predict right now that this list likely will have one of the greater divides in may years between SAG, generally an uncannily good bellwether of where Oscar winds are blowing, and the Academy nominations (to be announced January 22). The increasingly strong international makeup of Oscar voters might have some different ideas, so Neon in particular shouldn’t jump off the roof just yet. This Sunday’s Golden Globes indeed also might have different ideas: Four actors from Sentimental Value are competing in a film with eight overall nominations there, Brazil’s Secret Agent Wagner Moura could win, and No Other Choice’s Lee Byung Hun might upset. To give you an idea of the kind of American/international divide we are looking at, Neon — which is distributing most of the key international films this year — had a leading 21 nominations at the Globes. For the Actor Awards, they don’t have to bother pressing the tux and finding a different gown for the red carpet. They got zero.
RELATED: Golden Globes Nominations Revealed: ‘One Battle’ Leads Way; ‘Sinners’, Neon, Netflix, ‘Only Murders’, ‘White Lotus’ Score Well
From left: Emma Stone, Aidan Delbis and Jesse Plemons in ‘Bugonia’
Atsushi Nishijima/Focus Features/Everett Collection
Still, in the end, all of this might not matter because the three films that most likely will be lead the Oscars nominations — One Battle After Another, Sinners and Frankenstein — are well represented at SAG as well. In fact, One Battle’s record seven noms continues to cement its front-runner status after sweeping through the critics awards this season, an important turning point as we move into the industry awards. For Sinners, another Warner Bros film that opened in April, just a few weeks after last year’s SAG Awards took place, it really is impressive to see not just the Cast recognition and an expected lead actor nomination for Michael B. Jordan’s twin roles but also supporting love for Wunmi Mosaku and newcomer Miles Caton. Both were on the bubble in any Oscar prediction rundown, particularly Caton’s surprise entry at the expense of both Sentimental Value’s Stellan Skarsgard (really?) and Adam Sandler. Regarding Sandler, he sadly is a part of a complete snub of Jay Kelly, which was blanked by the actors along with another Netflix hopeful, Train Dreams. That’s a bit of a surprise since Kelly is all about them.
Kate Hudson in ‘Song Sung Blue’
Netflix, which will stream The Actor Awards live on March 1, does have to be happy about the performance of Frankenstein, which got three mentions including surprise Critics Choice winner Jacob Elordi but also for Cast, which wasn’t as expected. Also happy should be Focus Features, which triumphed last year with the Outstanding Cast win for Conclave, and landed again in that category this year with Hamnet, along with nominations for that film’s leads Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal. Focus also is represented by its Bugonia stars Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons and Song Sung Blue star Kate Hudson. That gives the distributor three of the five lead actress nominations alone; and BTW, Hudson is gaining serious momentum toward an Oscar nomination with her late-breaking performance, which also is up for a Globe on Sunday. Similarly, Ethan Hawke’s tour de force in the very small Blue Moon now seems to be on a good trajectory toward Oscar.
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Breaking the international curse a bit were individual nominations for Irish actors Buckley and Mescal (both playing Brits in the Elizabethan era) and Australian stars Elordi and Rose Byrne, the latter nominated for Lead Actress in If I Had Legs I’d Kick You (although she’s playing an American therapist in that).
Timothée Chalamet in ‘Marty Supreme‘
A24
The strong showing for Marty Supreme also is impressive. Sure, Timothée Chalamet and the Cast nomination weren’t big surprises, but Odessa A’zion’s Supporting nod at the expense of both Elle Fanning and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas from Sentimental Value was, to say the least, another not quite expected inclusion. Chalamet won at SAG last year for A Complete Unknown and could become the first to score back-to-back Lead Actor wins here.
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Stephen Graham, left, and Owen Cooper in ‘Adolescence’
Netflix
As for the television nominees, again we have the conundrum where both lead and supporting performers from the same shows have to face off against each other, thus we see Adolescence stars Stephen Graham and Owen Cooper in the same category, as well as Seth Rogen and Ike Barinholtz for The Studio. At least in the case of the latter, The Studio also is up for Outstanding Cast of a Comedy Series, so they both have a couple of chances at a trophy here. Graham and Cooper will really be a Solomon’s choice for SAG voters, though, because the Limited Series Actor category isn’t a Cast award. What you can bet on, as was the case at the Critics Choice Awards on Sunday and will be again this weekend at the Globes, is that voters again are likely to follow the lead of September’s Emmy Awards, which saw Adolescence, The Studio, and The Pitt all emerge as winners.
RELATED: Critics Choice Analysis: It‘s One Win After Another For ‘One Battle After Another’ As It Continues Steamrolling Through Awards Season
SAG-AFTRA
There are some new nominees for the Actor Awards that weren’t Emmy eligible or were just ignored and could break through including Jason Bateman in Black Rabbit, Matthew Rhys and Claire Danes for limited series The Beast in Me, the cast of Landman and newly minted Critics Choice winners Rhea Seehorn in Pluribus and Sarah Snook in All Her Fault. Otherwise the presence of The White Lotus, Severance, Abbott Elementary, Only Murders in the Building, Hacks, The Bear and The Diplomat will be familiar to Emmy viewers. That is not unusual since SAG’s awards often have followed the lead of the Emmys during the past 31 years.
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