Five Oscar Races Are Still Too Close to Call, Including Paul Giamatti vs. Cillian Murphy

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor All five of this year’s Academy Award-nominated original songs will be performed on the Dolby Theatre stage at the 96th Oscars. Jon Batiste, Becky G, Billie Eilish and Finneas O’Connell, Scott George and the Osage Singers, and as Variety previously reported, Ryan Gosling and Mark Ronson will perform the memorable numbers.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor Zendaya, Michelle Pfeiffer and Oscar winners Nicolas Cage and Al Pacino are among the first group of presenters for this year’s 96th Oscars ceremony. Also presenting are last year’s four acting winners — Brendan Fraser from “The Whale” and Michelle Yeoh, Ke Huy Quan, and Jamie Lee Curtis from the best picture winner “Everything Everywhere All at Once.” Oscar winners Mahershala Ali (“Moonlight” and “Green Book”), Jessica Lange (“Tootsie” and “Blue Sky”), Matthew McConaughey (“Dallas Buyers Club”), Lupita Nyong’o (“12 Years a Slave”) and Sam Rockwell (“Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri”) also are set to take the stage. Raj Kapoor serves as the Oscars’ executive producer and showrunner, alongside executive producers Molly McNearney and Katy Mullan.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor Just 30 minutes after final voting for the Screen Actors Guild Awards wrapped up, I made a last-minute switch in my best actress prediction — from Lily Gladstone in “Killers of the Flower Moon” to Emma Stone in “Poor Things.” Let this be a lesson: Second-guessing yourself is seldom a good idea. Lily Gladstone made history as the first Native American and Indigenous person to clinch an individual SAG Award for her portrayal of Mollie Burkhart, an Osage woman, in Martin Scorsese’s gripping crime saga.

Paul Giamatti is a nominee at the SAG Awards and he has his girlfriend Clara Wong there for support!

The Holdovers collaborators, director Alexander Payne and screenwriter David Hemingson, are working on another film together—a Western, in fact—and during a Q&A following a screening of The Holdovers at Soho House in West Hollywood on Friday, Hemingson revealed there’s a part earmarked for Paul Giamatti.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor After a year hit with Hollywood strikes and an early buzz positioning Christopher Nolan’s drama about the creation of the atomic bomb as a frontrunner, sentiments from more than a dozen Oscar voters on the first day of final voting revealed a strong backing for Nolan. “Nolan fucking deserves it,” an anonymous voter emphasizes to Variety, highlighting the widespread acclaim for Nolan’s direction and billion-dollar blockbuster.

Oscars. The uncertainty surrounding the strikes and the restrictions guilds placed on promoting contenders played havoc on Oscar campaigns. But some fared better than others thanks to the labor unrest, according to half-a-dozen industry watchers and awards experts who spoke with Variety.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor Margot Robbie, Idris Elba and Glen Powell are among the 30 presenters announced for the 30th Screen Actors Guild Awards, set to take place on Saturday. Additionally, Emmy and SAG Award winner Jennifer Aniston will present the 59th SAG Life Achievement Award to the legendary actor, singer, producer, writer and director Barbra Streisand.

Zack Sharf Digital News Director Cillian Murphy recently joined CBS’ “60 Minutes” for an interview on his “Oppenheimer” awards campaign tour and showed off his copy of the script written and directed by Christopher Nolan. In classic Nolan fashion, the screenplay is printed on red paper and written in black ink so it can’t be photocopied. It also includes a heartfelt note on the title page that Nolan wrote to Murphy: “Dearest Cillian.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor With just four days remaining until final Oscar voting officially opens, the race has taken a few unexpected turns at the BAFTA Awards. Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer,” a biographical drama about the father of the atomic bomb, has continued to surge ahead after seven wins, including best film and director. Its trajectory towards a triumphant night on the Dolby Theatre stage on March 10 seems assured.

“It genuinely feels like things are happening in real time.”

Something eerie is afoot in the small Irish town of Wexford, where coal merchant Bill Furlong (Cillian Murphy) raises five young daughters alongside his wife, Eileen (Eileen Walsh). It’s Christmastime 1985, the busiest time of the year for the Furlong family business, but Bill is not feeling like himself.

Tomris Laffly There is a pivotal scene in Greta Gerwig’s dust-pink “Barbie” that has come to define the Oscar-nominated movie — a disarmingly truthful monologue that is not delivered by the film’s many Barbies, nor its numerous Kens. Instead, supporting actress Oscar nominee America Ferrera’s Gloria crisply sums up the movie’s themes around a picture-perfect doll confronted by the real-world, patriarchy-fueled challenges of womanhood. “You have to answer for men’s bad behavior, which is insane, but if you point that out, you’re accused of complaining.

Paul Giamatti is our real-life Brad Pitt,” declares actress Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Giamatti’s Oscar-nominated co-star from “The Holdovers.” And she’s not joking. After all, as Randolph points out, “We can’t all be Brad Pitt, and I mean that in the most positive way.” The actor argues that Giamatti, in roles ranging from Revolutionary War heroes and Depression era boxing coaches to, in “The Holdovers,” a cranky New England boarding schoolteacher, has displayed a talent for always seeming natural on screen. Just as Pitt blazes on screen, Giamatti draws audiences in.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor “Always a bridesmaid, never the bride” certainly applies to the plight of 19 of this year’s longest-suffering Academy Award nominees. Spanning all 23 categories, these actors, filmmakers and artisans — including actor Annette Bening, filmmaker Wes Anderson and costume designer Jacqueline West — share a peculiar bond. Collectively, they have racked up an impressive 107 Oscar nominations over the years without once stepping onto the Dolby Theatre stage to deliver an acceptance speech.

Zack Sharf Digital News Director Cillian Murphy‘s “Oppenheimer” press tour is now in its final stages as the actor does his final weeks of campaigning in the lead up to the Oscars, where he’s nominated for best actor thanks to his leading turn in Christopher Nolan’s atom bomb epic. If it were up to Murphy, there might not have been a press tour to begin with.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor The 96th annual Oscar nominees luncheon gathered a vibrant crowd of celebrities, filmmakers and cinephiles at the iconic Beverly Hilton Hotel in Los Angeles. DeVon Franklin, a Board of Governors member, kicked off the event by announcing the roll call of attendees, starting with the esteemed composer Laura Karpman of “American Fiction” and concluding with the talented Robert Downey Jr., nominated for his supporting role in “Oppenheimer.” Here are some of the key takeaways from the event.

Oscar-nominated actor Cillian Murphy has admitted that he has struggled with being in the spotlight, but will be trying to enjoy the Academy Awards ceremony next month.

Cillian Murphy may be the hot favourite to win Best Actor at next month’s Oscars, but he has revealed he wasn’t the first choice for his breakthrough TV role.

Cillian Murphy has said that he studied every small detail about J. Robert Oppenheimer in his portrayal of the father of the atomic bomb last summer.In a Q&A on Friday at the Santa Barbra International Film Festival, the actor spoke to festival director Robert Durling about his characterisation in Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, saying he wanted to focus in particular on the small details of his character – especially with the film being shown on IMAX.Durling said he noted the cigarette stains on Murphy’s fingers during one scene, something that delighted Murphy.He explained (via Movie Maker): “I’m so glad you noticed that! Our amazing makeup artist Luisa Abel — we did that every single day and I would get really into the detail.