Top Ten: The Oldest Best Actress Line-Ups
Tuesday, December 10, 2013 at 12:30PM Statistics show us time and again that Oscar likes his ladies young. In fact 29 is the most common age that leading ladies win Oscars (for comparison's sake only one man under 30 has ever won Best Actor). And yet, as we speed towards the Oscar nominations, barring an extreme long-shot fresh-faced spoiler like an Adèle (20) or a Brie (26), this year's Best Actress Lineup will likely skew incredibly 'vintage'. If the expected five make an historic "all winners lineup" it's going to be the oldest lineup ever. Now, there is some degree of unusual feeling (I share it) that Meryl Streep (64) is vulnerable to a shut-out for her work in August: Osage County -- something that seemed unthinkable even a few months ago -- but even if she doesn't make the shortlist, there's no guarantee it'll be someone at the beginning of their career. Amy Adams (39) and Julia Louis Dreyfus (52) might still triumph over Brie or Adèle for that hotly contested fifth slot.
So let's look at...
The Top Ten Most Mature Best Actress Shortlists
This top ten is actually only nine years long. I'm reserving a spot for 2013. Barring a major upheaval, the 2013 lineup will be our oldest on average ever. Unless Adèle makes it... and even then it'll come close to being the very oldest. A funny thing occurred while researching this: the years I thought of as elderly weren't. I immediately thought of 1950, for example, with those grande dame performances by All About Eve's Bette Davis and Sunset Boulevard's Gloria Swanson (two of the best performances to lose the Oscar) but both of those women were barely 50 (Grande Dame used to start young!) and the rest of the category was young, younger and youngest. I was also wrong about these years which average a touch or a lot younger than I remembered or was expecting: 1960, 1962, 1974, 1990 and 1992.
Runners Up [3-way Tie] With an Average Age of 41.2 years
1997 As Good as It Get's Helen Hunt, the winner, was the median age of 34.
1996 Fargo's Frances McDormand, another median age winner, was 37.
1952 Come Back Little Sheba's Shirley Booth, pictured left and recently discussed, was the oldest at 52 and the winner. (She's still the only woman to win Best Actress during her fifties. Isn't that insane?) Can you guess which years made the list before you click to proceed? Try it silently for fun...
09. 1932/1933
average age 43
- Katharine Hepburn, Morning Glory (26)
- May Robson, Lady for a Day (75)
- Diana Wynyard, Cavalcade (28)
Robson yanked the average age way up. In fact, up until Riva surfaced last year she was one of the three oldest Oscar nominees ever in this category. The youngest nominee, Katharine Hepburn, won. Even Hepburn disciples today don't think Morning Glory is among her finest hours but such is the excitement of the new girls with Oscar.
08. 1985
average age 43.4
- Anne Bancroft, Agnes of God (54)
- Whoopi Goldberg, Color Purple (30)
- Jessica Lange, Sweet Dreams (36)
- Geraldine Page, Trip to Bountiful (61)
- Meryl Streep, Out of Africa (36)
If it hadn't been for the obscenely overdue status of Geraldine Page, a living legend who died just a year after the ceremony, another kind of history might have been made here with a win for Whoopi. But who knows? Perhaps Meryl was running second since Out of Africa was a humongous hit with both general audiences and AMPAS that year.
07. 2000
average age 43.4
- Allen, The Contender (44)
- Binoche, Chocolat (36)
- Burstyn, Requiem (68)
- Linney, You Can (36)
- Roberts, Brockovich (33)
Another year when the youngest star won. Despite a very vocal minority rooting for Burstyn, Roberts was never going to lose this at the peak of her stardom.
06. 2001
average age 44
- Halle Berry, Monster's Ball (35)
- Judi Dench, Iris (67)
- Nicole Kidman, Moulin Rouge! (34)
- Sissy Spacek, In the Bedroom (52)
- Renée Zelwegger, Bridget Jones's Diary (32)
Interesting that two years in a row with Oscar in this category the major battle was between a peaking beauty /star playing a struggling poor woman versus a legendary Oscar winner in a very dark drama. In both cases of course the former won. Question: is ageism less of a problem now or is it mere coincidence because of the unusual golden girl box office pull of Mirren, Dench, and Streep skewing the sample?
05. 1931/1932
average age 46.3
- Marie Dressler, Min & Bill (63)
- Lynn Fontane, The Guardsman (44)
- Helen Hayes, The Sin of Madelon Claudet (32)
If you've never seen Marie Dressler in Min & Bill, boy are you missing out. It's one of the most atypical Best Actress wins ever but she's utterly fab in a high energy surprising movie. It seems impossible to imagine it but she was a box office giant in her sixties way back at the dawn of the talkies.
04. 1989
average age 46.8
- Isabelle Adjani, Camille Claudel (34)
- Pauline Collins, Shirley Valentine (49)
- Jessica Lange, Musix Box (40)
- Michelle Pfeiffer, Fabulous Baker Boys (31)
- Jessica Tandy, Driving Miss Daisy (80)
1989...sigh... Also known as "The Year That Scarred Young Nathaniel Forever". In a somewhat atypical move, Oscar decided to go with the old lady -- Jessica Tandy was the most senior acting winner of all time until Christopher Plummer's Beginners stole that trivia answer -- when they could've had a young superstar goddess during her ascension at the peak of her beauty. A look through Oscar history will show you that this almost never happens but 1989 was a weird year with Oscar having a very reactionary conservative moment, and bristling against or trying to resist any of the sizzling contemporary stuff (see also the shunning of Do The Right Thing and that year's indie sensation sex, lies and videotape) and La Pfeiff was sizzling contemporary stuff.
03. 1978
average age 47.6
- Ingrid Bergman, Autumn Sonata (63)
- Ellen Burstyn, Same Time Next Year (46)
- Jill Clayburgh, An Unmarried Woman (34)
- Jane Fonda, Coming Home (41)
- Geraldine Page, Interiors (54)
I don't have much to say about this year other than "isn't it fab?" Not only is it full of sensational actresses but it's also very womanly in its thematic concerns. Geraldine Page as "Ivy" in Interiors is everything and though I wouldn't have given Jane Fonda her second win this year, she's pretty damn terrific at charting her sexual entanglement with a disabled vet.
02. 1967
average age 48.2
- Anne Bancroft, The Graduate (36)
- Faye Dunaway, Bonnie & Clyde (27)
- Edith Evans, The Whisperers (80)
- Audrey Hepburn, Wait Until Dark (38)
- Katharine Hepburn, Guess Who's Coming To Dinner (60)
It's funny to think of Anne Bancroft as the original "cougar" if you will since she was only 36 when The Graduate premiered, just six years older than the "young" man she was seducing, and the second youngest of these nomines. I will never be okay with Katharine Hepburn's win this year -- by far the least of this otherwise awesome box set -- but what can you do?
01. 2006
average age 50.6
- Penelope Cruz, Volver (32)
- Judi Dench, Notes on a Scandal (72)
- Helen Mirren, The Queen (61)
- Meryl Streep, Devil Wears Prada (57)
- Kate Winslet, Little Children (31)
AKA "The Year when Dame Helen Mirren Inexplicably Steamrolled and No One Raised a Fuss About It Even Though She'd Been Better Before and Most Of Her CoStars Were Doing Their (Arguable) Best Work Ever." Whew. I know that's an unwieldly title for any Best Actress year but this is a fun annual to talk about. We do it often.
Ready. Set. Go...
Reader Comments (74)
I think Meryl is surprisingly vulnerable in this race, but I don't mind as much, particularly if Adele Exarchopolous or Julia Louis-Dreyfus takes her place. I wish Judi Dench was more vulnerable, even though I liked her performance in Philomena and appreciate how the role plays with the iron-willed, no nonsense persona that is her calling card as a film actress. She plays a lot of delicate grace notes in that role that not many other actresses can do in my opinion. If only the script had served her better.
All that said, and the merits of each performance aside, there's a huge part of me that's thrilled that such a mature actress line-up is dominating the awards circuit. It's a very small step towards progress: hey, women over 40 can open movies and are still interesting! It shouldn't be news, but considering the business, it's not surprising that it is. Maybe in a few years time, Alfre Woodard or Viola Davis or Angela Bassett can be there, or Maggie Cheung comes out of retirement for one more great role, or Gong Li gets another role as good as in her 90s heyday or Michelle Yeoh gets a great role and finally gets some respect for her vastly underappreciated acting talents. One can dream...
I'm all for Dench, Blanchett, Bullock and...Streep if she's good. Would like that 5th spot to go to Exarchopoulos. I think Thompson's chances have been highly overhyped, as has her film and the supporting work of Tom Hanks in it. Does anyone really care about "Mary Poppins" and what it took to get it to the screen? It is nearly unwatchable today. Poor Kim Stanley. And from the director of "The Blind Side?"
I never understood what happened with the Mirren frenzy in 2006, It's not a bad performance, but it's not a great one! Furthermore, it was a great year for leading actresses and for once, the Academy did a pretty good job with the nominees. The saddest thing for me is that the Meryl Streep loss probably created a chain reaction that led to Viola Davis losing in 2011. Sad. Meryl should have won in 2006.
Nathaniel, I really think you're underestimating the possibility of Amy Adams landing in this lineup. She's really garnered a surprising amount of MVP mentions in the reviews thus far and if people like American Hustle then I see them having no problem putting her down as #1. Not to mention, Adams has been working the press circuit very well.
We always talk about how the demographics of AMPAS skew older, white males. I really see these voters voting for Adams and her role of a 70's vixen that will bring them back to the days of their youth.
Cool post!! Interesting how relatively recent most of these years are (aside from the two 30s lineups). Only 2 from before 1967 and 4 (including this year) from 2000 and beyond.
Just a small correction, for 1931/32, Marie Dressler was nominated for "Emma", not "Min and Bill". LOVE her in "Min and Bill" though, and it's definitely an underrated performance.
Also on an unrelated note, is the Supporting Actress Smackdown for 2003 going to be posted? I'm anxiously awaiting the results and analysis!!
Wow, Patryk, perhaps you should join some commenters in the Snark Dept. Does anyone really "care" about a young girl's budding sexuality, or a rich lady who drinks too much and married to a crooked husband, or an astronaut who's lost in space, or some crazy-ass family in Oklahoma? It's all just storytelling. You might not like the story, but we're talking about performances here.
I don't know, do you really think Meryl Streep is more vulnerable than Dench? I should think is the other way around. Perhaps because AOC hasn't hit the theatres yet and I haven't read much about how the film is playing for Academy members. But i feel that Judi Dench's buzz has diminished considerably. Nobody sees her as a challenger. Meryl Streep in AOC, on the other hand, as she has vocal detractors she also has people who are vocal about how great she is in that film. And perhaps because it's a more histrionic work. I don't know, obviously I haven't seen AOC but from the clips I've watched as the Weston matriarch i can imagine that performance is going to do very well with Academy members, and she may even go from a 4th spot to a 3rd spot. Who knows. Just my feelings; if anybody will be bumped out, i must think it's Dench, not Streep.
Meryl shutout?!? for a role as juicy as this?!? Come on Nathaniel, you should know better. If anyone’s getting booted---to make room for Amy or Adele---its Dench.
Nathan, this is a fascinating article, thank you for your meticulous research. I will never get over Anne not winning for The Graduate. Makes watching Guess Who's Coming To Dinner that much more of a chore. Sigh.
And I agree, Streep is much more vulnerable than Dench, whose film many voters will see as possibly her last chance at Oscar. Never count out sentimentality when it comes to AMPAS.
Every time I look at that 2006 lineup I go, "WOW!!"
I don't care if it's wishful thinking. I'm calling that Amy AND Adèle make it. If my non-moviegoing hometown friends are any indication, American Hustle is going to make a ton of money at the box office at just the right time--I'm thinking it gets at least 3 acting nods. And Adèle has the #1 votes on her side. Devout and determined is enough to get you in, especially in a year where consensus has been spread.
if this is the lineup for this year (SAG and Globes may bring some changes we will see) Blanchett will win. She is the youngest and arguably the sexiest of the lineup. That is usually the pattern as was pointed out
Streep is in...
Also worth saying I think just about every category is going to have upsets. There's a lot of passion this year for a lot of different films, there have been significant changes in the voting demographics over the last couple years, and since the Best Picture switch-up, voters seem to be getting more crafty with their picks than usual. Just look at last year. Benh Zeitin, Amour, no Ben, no Kathryn, Emmanuelle, Quvenzhané, Jacki...and that year had way more consensus than this one does! I don't even think the below-the-line nominations will be in lockstep this year. So fun!
I think that either Judi Dench or Emma Thompson will budge for Amy Adams. The Academy is in love with her for reasons that elude me.
I can't see Meryl Streep missing out on a nomination for playing Violet Weston in a Harvey Weinstein film.
I don't understand why the women of 1990 didn't qualify?
Bates was 42
Huston was 39
Roberts was 23
Streep was 41
Woodward was 61
Mirren won because she was the best that year (though I appreciate other four roles nominated). Pfeiffer obviously didn't deserve to win with Tandy (or Adjani!). But I agree with your critique of Hepburn's win for "Guess..".
I honestly don't see a scenario in which Adams does not get in. That film is too beloved and her performance is too showy for it not to land. Heck, if she could get in for something as low-key as The Master, she won't have a problem this time around. Sorry Dench/Meryl.
3rtful -- good catch. if you're correct on ages that makes them tied for runners up in 1990.
Someone -- you can check more than just my opinion. a LOT of people think Pfeiffer deserved to win that year, including every critics group at the time.
Ugh, not enough people are talking about Brie. She deserves to be in there.
Streep in.... Dench out
So much depends on how the screenings are going and the campaigning. I see Streep as vulnerable as much because she is so different from the Violet on stage (that woman was incredible!) and with the play still fresh on people's minds, she doesn't measure up. Her recent win for a good perf in a terrible movie also counts against her.
I could see Dench as vulnerable except she should have been nom'd for Skyfall. I can see either Brie (depending on further buzz) or Adele Extraconsonants&syllables getting in.
Adams is possible but as a 4 time loser, she needs something really special to put her ahead of the pack and Hustle doesn't sound like the one.
Thompson has been working it big time and is so loved at the moment that I see her as almost a lock.....more than Bullock actually.
We will know a lot more when Globe and SAG noms are announced.
I cannot see the Streep nomination not happening with Weinstein... music of the heart anyone?
And it is not like she is not making the critics lists more than others....
Streep is far from vulnerable and the fifth spot. She is Ahead of Dench and Thompson and probably Bullock.
"Her recent win for a good perf in a terrible movie also counts against her."
THIS!
Also, I think we cannot rule out Streep fatigue at this point. Especially in a year this competitive. And the movie itself is not getting buzz, with terrible direction being singled out.
Guys, if anyone is vulnerable it's not Dench/Streep it's BULLOCK. I know she's had one hell of a year and her performance was (mostly) praised but she hasn't been cited that much and when it comes down to it, I really do think that Academy members will see Gravity more as a technological and directorial achievement. It really isn't a performance piece, as much as everyone thinks it is. And I actually really liked Sandra in the film.
Dench was probably running sixth last year for Skyfall. She's definitely getting in and supposedly Philomena is going over very well with Academy members. And it really is hard to see Meryl losing, although it is curious to ponder if her recent and divisive third win will hinder members from voting for her. Regardless, Harvey is behind both of these films, and if he can get Jacki Weaver and Chocolat Oscar nominations...seriously, come on.
I just hope that if Bullock misses out Adele takes her place, although I worry it will be Amy Adams who is in a hyped-up best picture nominee. Ugh. Over her.
Sag nominations tomorrow will be telling
I always think of 2006 as such an incredible year for Actress (even if I wouldn't have voted for Mirren, who was still fantastic), and I wonder if this year will be similar. I was disappointed by Dench, but I'm excited to see Streep/Thompson/Adams. Interesting too that Actress 2006 was so delicious that the two non-winners at the time, Winslet and Cruz, both won at their next opportunity (2008) to make it an all winners line-up. Maybe this is good news if Adams sneaks in.
I'm quite sure the average age of the 2011 nominees was around 45...
2006 was the year I started obsessing over the Oscars as opposed to just caring.
I was already fascinated by the fact that Meryl had that many nominations (and I actually thought that that was proof that she was the best actress ever) and wanted to know who predicted her to get one more for The Devil Wears Prada. That led me to the filmexperience and my life was about to change forever!
I was really hoping Meryl would win that year :/
Mirren was great in 2006, but Winslet easily should have won her first Oscar for Little Children. She was fabulous in that movie!
It actually did change me forever, he's not kidding!
Just another slight correction: Bette Davis was 42, not 50, when nominated for All About Eve.
The best actress of 2006 was MAGGIE GYLLENHAAL in Sherrybaby.
And her supporting turns in Stranger than Fiction and WTC.
I want meryl in, but I'm too thinking she vulnerable... amy adams is campaigning HARD, and she got in for things like "doubt" and "the master" so...
There're lots of things I never thought I'd live to see. One of them is Bullock winning BA over Streep. But it was the heat of the moment, ok. I'll leave the shock and the analysis for future generations of pundits who'll write in depth anaylisis wondering how it was possible... But to accept that Bullock is considered more of a lock than Streep for August: Osage County requires more suspension of disbelief than most Shaymalan movies.
Aaron-there's no way they're passing on a critically-acclaimed, Oscar-endorsed movie star in a Best Picture frontrunner. The last time a Best Picture nominee starred an Oscar-winning woman in the lead role and the woman didn't get an Oscar nomination was The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and you have to go back to 1991 to find another example (Streisand in The Prince of Tides). It's extremely rare for an Oscar-winning actress to lead a Best Picture nominee and not get a nomination herself. It's worth noting that this theory would be tested if August Osage or Philomena got into the Best Picture race and Streep or Dench do not.
PFEIFFER WAS PHENOMENAL IN 1989. She undoubtedly deserved to win over Tandy
OK, that was spooky. My life is a troll!
I think that a month ago you wrote a post about this race and I told you a line-up all under 35 only happened once, but I see now I was wrong and Clayburgh was not 35 in 1979, but 34.
That means this will be the first year ever in which we'll have no nominees under 35.
But I don't it to happen, since I'll be rooting very hard for Adele.
On Pfeiffer: I love her in Baker Boys, but you just can't beat Adjani in Camille Claudel.
It's strange that the 2006 lineup ended up being so firm. I distinctly remember that for at least a couple of months or so it was so clear that those were the five. When usually in years where there's someone way out front for the win (Mirren), you actually end up with really fluid nominee lists. Like in 2003 when it was clearly Charlize Theron, three of the five nominees on that list (Morton, Castle-Hughes and Watts) never felt like sure things.'
I'm too young to remember, so I'm just going to throw it out to anyone who wants to answer. Was Tandy over Pfeiffer a surprise? Were people expecting Pfeiffer to win and then Jessica Tandy won in an upset? Or was it a Penn/Rourke situation where they were running neck and neck the entire time?
Agreed that Min and Bill is totally great and it's on Youtube in one pristine clip. Dressler came in that flurry of like three or four Canadian (whoo!) Best Actress winners in a row.
Katharine Hepburn is a weird actress for me in that I first learned about her while watching the performances she won Best Actress for and thus was convinced initially that I didn''t like her as an actress. The reason being that I'm not particularly fond of any of the four performances she won her Oscars for. The Lion in Winter is fine and I haven't seen the other nominees from the Morning Glory year. But the other two times she won, she was unquestionably the weakest in my mind of the five performances. It makes me think of how Jennifer Lawrence is going to be viewed years from now when she, like Hepburn, is a memory. Like with Hepburn, I hope that Lawrence is not judged unfairly for her Oscar-winning performance as some kind of barometer of her best work.
(NOTE: I am not qualitatively comparing Jennifer Lawrence to Katharine Hepburn. Just drawing a parallel in terms of the disparity between greatest work and rewarded performances. Fans/haters of either please please please don't kill me. Sorry for the length of the comment. I see the words "Oldest" and "Actress" and I just start typing).
I find it weird some people think Streep is vulnerable, the idea of her being vulnerable practically almost makes me laugh.
We're talking about Oscar's most consistently recognized actor (male or female) + an Oscar-tailored role + Harvey Weinstein.
In the weirdest case scenario she'll go supporting or something.
Yavor, I think it's just that take-it-for-granted attitude that just might turn off Oscar voters. It might just finally be time not to nominate Meryl just cuz she's Meryl.
As cliche as it is, Meryl Streep has been my favorite actress since I saw Out of Africa as a kid and The Devil Wears Prada is my favorite of her recent performances. I really, really wish she had won her third Oscar for that role. I would have easily ranked Judi second and Penelope third that year.
In fact, I think Streep and Dench's performances in Prada and Scandal are two of the best of the decade. Mirren was greatly helped that year because she didn't yet have an Oscar.
@NathanielR: It doesn't mean anything. Critics are wrong more ofthen than not. :) Pfeiffer would be a good choice but surely nothing wrong has happened when she lost. :P
For years I've been complaining about the Academy's tendency to pick the youngest/hottest actress. For some reason, when it seems that a line-up of well-established veterans is happening, I can't help rooting for Adéle, Brie or even such a dark horse as Paulina García. I am a human contradiction!
P.S. When this season ends we really need to discuss 1989. It's such a good year and the Academy got it so wrong.
I haven't seen Philomena yet, but if there's any justice—I know, there isn't much when it comes to these things—Blanchett will be the only actress in that collage at the top of this article to get a nomination this year. Seriously, folks. SERIOUSLY.
Weren't Adrien Brody AND Richard Dreyfuss under 30 for their Best Actor wins? So I believe it's two and not just one.
I called 2000, 1978, 1989, and 2006 but I didn't expect '06 to be number one just because Winslet always drags age averages down. Wasn't that her fifth nomination and she was only 31? She's the new Jodie Foster! But when will either of those great actresses be nominated again?
Time changes everything. Pfeiffer in red dress singing "Makin' Whoopee" is one of the most iconic images I can think of the 80s.