This year’s Academy Awards — set for March 2, on ABC — promise to be an unapologetic celebration of films that are MAGA’s worst nightmare. The movies being honored include works that are pro-immigrant, pro-woman, pro-trans, and pro-culture, not to mention anti-racism and anti-dictatorship. There’s even one (The Apprentice) that’s specifically anti-Trump!
Of course Trump-hating on the Oscars — aka, the Liberal Olympics — is nothing new. You’ll remember that last year’s host, Jimmy Kimmel, snuck in some great swipes at the guy, especially when he read aloud Trump’s tweet trashing Kimmel’s hosting performance, then fired back, “Thank you for watching … Isn’t it past your jail time?” But this year’s host, Conan O’Brien, faces a different landscape. Trump didn’t go to jail after all; he went back to the White House. And in December, ABC settled his defamation case against them to the tune of $15 million.
Fortunately, comedy is more protected than news reporting. But if O’Brien chickens out and gets tongue-tied anyway, he can blame the more somber tone that’s expected this year because of the horrifying fires that have ravaged California. Reportedly, the more humbled Oscars will continually spotlight Los Angeles as a wonderful city of dreams (but not for the four losers in each category, lol). Also, they plan to omit live performances of the Best Song nominees, instead focusing on the personal arcs of the nominated songwriters. This development is weird — songs went over great on the Grammys — but if it means there won’t be a return to stuff like the 1999 interpretive dance to the sounds of Saving Private Ryan, complete with Savion Glover tap dancing, it could genuinely lift spirits.
My own Oscar ritual stays intact, however, and so, here are my predictions for some of the major categories. They will probably be wrong, but I will give a great performance in relating them. And so …
BEST PICTURE
The nominees are …
The Brutalist
A three-and-a-half-hour epic — with a 15-minute intermission built in — this fictional period drama screams “Oscar!” but deserves it too. A post-WWII tale of a Holocaust survivor who ends up working as an architect for a sociopathic U.S. tycoon, it’s a potent exploration of commerce versus creativity, as well as an elaborately constructed (and much needed) celebration of what immigrants bring to — and go through in — our country. Alas, the long running time and long-faced dramatics have turned off some voters, whose minds have obviously melted in the Instagram era.
A Complete Unknown
After this film, Bob Dylan remains a supremely enigmatic figure, but A for effort and the musical sequences definitely don’t blow (in the wind or otherwise).
Conclave
A cardinal researching candidates hoping to become the new Pope makes for heady Vatican melodrama, especially since scandals apparently can harm candidates in this arena. The shockeroo ending made me a believer. But this film — which bagged SAG’s ensemble award — will come in as a first-runner-up, picking up a few of the smaller Oscars along the way.
Dune: Part Two
These portentous sand spectacles always leave me expecting Angela Bassett to saunter in and intone, “Welcome to Dune: Part Two” before realizing she’s in the wrong movie. Sorry, this can’t win.
Emilia Pérez
The year’s most thrillingly original film is this French lesbian trans musical, in Spanish. As trans people come under attack in the U.S., Emilia focuses on a Mexican drug cartel thug simultaneously transitioning to female and trying to be a better person — and she’s played by a trans actor, the kind of thing Hollywood never thinks of doing! But hold on to your embroidered maxi dress. Activists came forward to criticize the film’s supposedly stereotypical trans and Mexican content, and then lead actress Karla Sofia Gascón’s incendiary social media posts about topics like race and religion resurfaced — all with a timing that would have made onetime Oscar kingpin Harvey Weinstein proud. In the wake of the bad press, Emilia is more divisive than ever, but I’m predicting it to still bag several Oscars, including Best International Feature and Best Song.
I’m Still Here
The true story of an activist refusing to accept the disappearance of her politician husband under Brazilian tyranny in 1971, the film is an all-too-relevant attack on authoritarianism’s wicked ways.
Nickel Boys
A challenging sit that doesn’t pander, Nickel Boys is based on Colson Whitehead’s novel about two African American boys sent to a horrible reform school in Florida. The best thing about it is Jomo Fray’s extraordinary first-person POV cinematography — which didn’t even get nominated!
The Substance
Directed by French filmmaker Coralie Fargeat, this is a bristling satire of the way show biz — and society in general — tries to make women feel irrelevant after a certain age. It culminates with a gross-out session that has scared off some weenies, but their fears won’t age well.
Wicked
The first of the two Wicked films, based on the Broadway prequel to The Wizard of Oz, this musical glance at racism actually makes you feel for the Wicked Witch of the West — before she got that way. It’s all kind of relentless and too much, but also gorgeous and somehow just right.
And the winner will be:
Anora
In Sean Baker’s romp, a Brooklyn stripper hooks up with the son of a Russian oligarch, leading to all sorts of complications and machinations. Once you submit to the nonstop screaming — presented as a screwball comedy device — you’re in for quite a ride, with Baker (The Florida Project) filling the screen with wildly engaging anger and hormones. This is far from your typical Best Picture, but Anora has already seized Critics Choice, DGA, and PGA awards, so its Oscar hopes are as high as an oligarch’s son. If this Russian-mocking frolic really wins, Trump can blame Zelenskyy.
BEST ACTOR
The nominees are …
Adrien Brody, The Brutalist
Yes, actors can win more than one Oscar. Emma Stone did it just last year. And no, this film isn’t just The Pianist: Part Two. It’s primarily set after WWII, and in America. And Brody gives a full-throttled, fascinating performance that deserves to be honored. In fact, he was the front-runner … until a little Bob Dylan movie started knockin’ on heaven’s door.
Colman Domingo, Sing Sing
A great actor, Domingo gets his second nomination as a prisoner who teaches the joys of theater to the other inmates (played by the real-life people involved), thanks to the title institution’s Rehabilitation Through the Arts program. It might sound like something out of The Producers, but Sing Sing is actually serious stuff and should have been up for Best Picture. Will the sequel be Dance Dance?
Ralph Fiennes, Conclave
Fiennes — who’s never won — got his third nomination for playing the faith-challenged cardinal who has to help select a new Pope, after the old one croaks. He superbly carries the film, but his role doesn’t have quite enough variety for him to be crowned the new Pope of movieland.
Sebastian Stan, The Apprentice
Succeeding in a seemingly impossible assignment, Stan manages to convey Donald Trump’s schmucky hunger for power while not falling into a Vegas-style impersonation. He’s so good in the part that when he out-schmucks his amoral mentor, lawyer Roy Cohn, you’re not surprised. Side note: The impact of the film, which depicts Donald Trump maritally raping Ivana, becomes more complex on learning that the director groped an actor at a Golden Globes party; that incident wasn’t publicly revealed until after Oscar voting closed.
And the winner will be:
Timothée Chalamet, A Complete Unknown
Chalamet has long gone past the cute twink phase and proven that he can not only act, he can make tons of money for a very thirsty Hollywood. He is widely admired for his chutzpah and he will get this award for his opaque Bob Dylan, becoming the youngest Best Actor ever. (The previous youngest was … Adrien Brody.) How do I know Chalamet will win? He just nabbed the SAG Award, which has predicted the Best Actor Oscar winner 18 out of the past 20 times.
BEST ACTRESS
Cynthia Erivo, Wicked
In her green makeup and high black hat, Erivo makes a poignant Elphaba and sings like a star, but Oscar has only given Best Actress to one Black lady before — Halle Berry, in 2002. Perhaps voters need to re-watch Wicked, and pay attention to the themes this time.
Karla Sofia Gascón, Emilia Pérez
The first out trans actor to be Oscar-nominated, Gascón is a miracle, first as the ruthless cartel leader living as a man and then as the transitioned wannabe do-gooder who misses her children. Fearlessly, she breaks your heart with her singing and emoting. And, cancel me now, but I didn’t disagree with all of her tweets. (Is anyone really mad that she found the tortuous 2021 Oscars too preachy or that she’s against any religious “morons that violate human rights”?) But some of Gascón’s more toxically expressed messages have created a guarantee that someone else will win this category. Still, I love that she’s become a MAGA’s ultimate dilemma: “I love her Muslim-bashing … but she’s trans!”
Mikey Madison, Anora
She was in Better Things and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, but Madison is still too “new” to win. Still, she’s a fabulous discovery, throwing herself headfirst into the role of a feisty stripper who ends up in a fractured Cinderella fairy tale that careens out of her control. Her BAFTA winning performance has a genius way of stripping away artifice, not just clothes.
Fernanda Torres, I’m Still Here
Torres’s mother, Fernanda Montenegro, was the first Brazilian actress to get Oscar-nominated (for Walter Salles’s 1998 road movie, Central Station). She also appears in this Salles film, in which daughter Torres — the second Brazilian actress to get a nom — is so commanding that she landed the nomination over much bigger names.
And the winner will be:
Demi Moore, The Substance
Nothing pleases Oscar more than a triumphant personal trajectory, especially if it matches the theme of the film being honored. Demi was the highest-paid female movie star in 1995, but she was vastly underrated by critics — and even by herself — and eventually became, let’s say, fame-challenged. And now she stunningly brings her personal baggage to the role of a woman who show biz is trying to force obsolescence on, because she’s purportedly past her prime. Demi is anything but, nabbing a whole new chapter out of this film — and her much-discussed Golden Globe acceptance speech, about how she was once told she’s nothing but “a popcorn actress,” clinched her imminent Oscar victory. This could be the first Oscar for a Golden Globe speech.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
The nominees are …
Yura Borisov, Anora
The Russian actor is a juicy find as Igor, the henchman who’s assigned to look after the title sex worker, with interesting results. His expert bantering — and mysterious edges — help the film end on a wow.
Edward Norton, A Complete Unknown
Four-time nominee Norton has become an old pro, dropping into films and blessing them with his expert touch. Here, he does so by adding emotional heft and authenticity as folk singer Pete Seeger.
Guy Pearce, The Brutalist
As the industrialist who hires soulful immigrant Adrien Brody to build a complex, Pearce is rivetingly quirky in both his charm and his sadism. I feel Pearce deserves the award, but my taste is rarely in line with voters.
Jeremy Strong, The Apprentice
Strong is very good as Trump’s spirit animal, sleazy lawyer Roy Cohn, but memories of previous, award-winning Roy Cohns — Ron Leibman, Al Pacino, and Nathan Lane — linger in the mind.
And the winner will be:
Kieran Culkin, A Real Pain
Culkin and Jesse Eisenberg play cousins reuniting for a Holocaust group tour in Poland, making for a bold mix of drama and comedy. In the process, Culkin gets to portray a directionless person who explodes into weird outbursts, while also being sort of lovable. Is it Succession all over again? Maybe, but this performance has already won a slew of awards, including the Golden Globe, the SAG, and the BAFTA.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
The nominees are …
Monica Barbaro, A Complete Unknown
Every year, there’s at least one nominee that makes me go “Huh?” As Joan Baez, Barbaro (Top Gun: Maverick) is fine, but she isn’t Joan Baez. Still, the Academy loves to anoint a pretty 30-something, and she does her own singing and guitar playing.
Ariana Grande, Wicked
What next, Oscar winner Britney Spears? No, wait a second. Ariana has the gift, able to make her Glinda character wittily enjoyable while singing and dancing like an angel.
Felicity Jones, The Brutalist
Jones nabbed enough “What have you done to my husband?” moments to clinch this nod. A previous nominee for The Theory of Everything, she happens to have wonderful old-school acting chops.
Isabella Rossellini, Conclave
I blinked and missed Rosellini’s appearance, but the nomination is because we love her, and besides, if you do manage to catch her in her nun’s get-up, you’ll be reminded of her triple-Oscar-winning mama, Ingrid Bergman, in The Bells of St. Mary’s.
And the winner will be:
Zoe Saldana, Emilia Pérez
She’s appeared in the Avatar and Avengers franchises, but it took this fabulously oddball international film for people to realize she’s far from a popcorn actress. Arguably Emilia’s co-lead, Saldana is fierce as the frustrated lawyer who gets her chance for greatness and will rap and dance her ass off in the process. The strength of the performance should cut through the film’s counterblast.
BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Period-perfect jeans, suede jackets, and ponchos for A Complete Unknown (designed by Arianne Phillips); clerical red, black, and gold ritualistic ensembles for Conclave (Lisy Christl); elaborate Gothic creepery for Nosferatu (Linda Muir); and what looked like ancient-Roman adult diapers and shrouds for Gladiator 2 (Janty Yates and Dave Crossman) all did their job of grabbing attention while not overwhelming the action.
But the award will go to Paul Tazewell (Oscar winner for 2021’s West Side Story reboot) for his extraordinary work on Wicked. Whether dressing witches, students, wizards, or weirdos, Tazewell’s looks were full of color and imagination, helping the movie cast a spell that Halloween rental stores will be grateful for in perpetuity.
See you on March 2! ❖
Michael Musto has written for the Voice since 1984, best known for his outspoken column “La Dolce Musto.” He has penned four books, and is streaming in docs on Netflix, Hulu, Vice, and Showtime.