Oscars: Chloe Zhao Becomes Second Woman to Win Best Director

The tradition of featuring the Academy Award winner for Best Director on Variety‘s post-Oscars cover continues with “Nomadland”‘s Chloe Zhao. On the morning after her historic award win that saw her become only the second woman to win the directing honour and the first woman of colour to do so, Zhao tells Variety all about the honour and “Nomadland”‘s Best Picture win.

Academy Awards to win the award and the first woman of color.Only Kathryn Bigelow, 11 years ago for “The Hurt Locker,” had previously won the award. The win, widely expected, caps the extraordinary rise of the China-born Zhao, a lyrical filmmaker whose “Nomadland” is just her third feature.

The 93rd Academy Awards were held on April 25, 2021. After facing a tough year worldwide thanks to the pandemic, the awards ceremony honoured the work of films that still released and entertained audiences in these trying times.

Frances McDormand - a woman who leaves her hometown in Nevada after her husband dies and the sole industry closes down, and then travels around the US in search of seasonal work. Fern is not a real person, but the film is based on Jessica Bruder's non-fiction book Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century, which follows the trend of older Americans moving around the country for seasonal jobs.

Nomadland was named best picture at the 2021 Oscars on Sunday. "We thank the Academy, and we thank our brilliant fellow nominees," said director and producer Chloé Zhao as she stepped up to the podium with producersMollye Asher, Dan Janvey, Frances McDormand and Peter Spears.

Nomadland, directed by the Chinese filmmaker Chloé Zhao, is part of a long lineage of non-American American art, from Wim Wenders’ Paris, Texas to Andrea Arnold’s American Honey. It grapples with grief, the betrayals of capitalism, and the lure of the open road.

#Oscars pic. twitter.

Marvel fans have reacted with excitement to Chloe Zhao’s Best Director win at the 93rd Academy Awards. Zhao, who took home the prize for her independent road movie Nomadland, also directed the forthcoming Marvel Cinematic Universe film Eternals.

On a night in which Netflix led all studios with 35 Oscar nominations, traditional distributors had the last laugh, as Searchlight's Nomadland landed the top prize. Likewise, Chloé Zhao picked up the best director statue for the film, a modern-day odyssey of the dispossessed surviving on the edges of the American dream.

While the night featured some surprises, there was no surprise when Oscar-winner Rita Moreno announced the Best Picture winner with Searchlight’s Nomadland taking home the top prize and completing its historic season long sweep of the top award. It was the film’s third win of the night with director Chloé Zhao making her own history by becoming the first female Asian-American women to win best director.

A remodeled Oscars 2021 awards ceremony took place in Los Angeles on Sunday evening and ignited a glimmer of hope in otherwise dark times. With maskless nominees coming together to celebrate films across genres, the Los Angeles Union Station was all glammed up for the occasion.

Nomadland filmmaker on Sunday won the Oscar for Best Director, making her the first woman of color to ever win this award. In fact, she was the first woman of color to even be nominated for Best Director.

Marvel Studios' upcoming Eternals movie — has broken new ground with an Oscars 2021 win. The Chinese filmmaker won the Best Director prize at Sunday's ceremony for her movie Nomadland, the Frances McDormand-starring film about a woman travelling across the US in a van after her husband's death.

Chloe Zhao completed her awards season sweep on Sunday, taking home the Academy Award for Best Director for her stunning 2020 film, “Nomadland”. With the win, Zhao becomes the first woman of colour, and second woman ever, to take home the Oscars’ top directing honour.

Rebecca Rubin Film and Media ReporterFor the first time in more than a decade — and only the second time in history — a woman has won the Oscar for best director.Chloé Zhao on Sunday night took home the Academy Award for best director for “Nomadland,” a sweeping drama about a widow in her 60s (Frances McDormand) who travels the Western United States in a van after losing her job in the Great Recession.

Chloe Zhao is making Oscars history!

Chloe Zhao completed her awards season sweep on Sunday, taking home the Academy Award for Best Director for her stunning 2020 film,.