Hailee Steinfeld loves herself, okay?
Wednesday, August 19, 2015 at 11:59PM 
Did you hear that the now 18 year old True Grit and Pitch Perfect 2 star has released a single? With "Love Myself" she becomes the first Oscar nominee to launch a music career since... um... wait, wait, it'll come to me.
Bruce Willis, Brie Larson, and Linday Lohan tried it years ago but they weren't Oscar nominees. Eddie Murphy and Kim Basinger did it briefly in the 80s but that was long before Oscar paid them any mind. Russell Crowe did it before becoming a movie star and kept on doing it. Jamie Foxx started recording years before the musical biopic Oscar win in Ray. Jared Leto abandoned the movies for quite a long time to be a rock star but that was also before Oscar love. Most recently Scarlett Johansson started a recording career but Oscar has yet to notice her. (sigh). Post Oscar Examples will come to me after we get back to our topic.
Anyway...
Hailee has gone for an "I Touch Myself"/"She Bop" style single what with that Self-Service tank in the video for "Love Myself"
Hey, you'd turn yourself on, too, if you were Oscar-nominated for your debut film. Do tell us what you think of the video in the comments, won't you? (You may also recall that Hailee was the star of my choice for "best shot" from Taylor Swift's Bad Blood video)
Previous Actors To Launch Music Careers After Their Oscar Nominations
I'd love this to be a comprehensive list but I'm sure I missed someone. Help if you can...
2000s
Minnie Driver's latest album "Ask Me To Dance" Toni Collette . Oscar nominated for The Sixth Sense (1999). Released one album "Beautiful Awkward Pictures" in 2006. You can also hear her great pipes on the Original Broadway Cast Album of Michael John Lachiusa's "Wild Party"
Minnie Driver. Oscar nominated for Good Will Hunting (1997). Released her debut album "Everything I've Got in My Pocket" in 2004. Beautiful voice. She's since released two more albums.
Juliette Lewis. Oscar nominated for Cape Fear (1991). Juliette and the Licks released their debut album in 2004 with their first hit "You're Speaking My Language" - damn that track was goood. She's since released three more albums. I miss her music. I listened to "Uh Huh" so much in 2010!
1980s
Isabelle Adjani. First Oscar nominated for The Story of Adele H. (1975). After a Cannes win for 2 roles and two Cesars for best actress in the early 80s she released her only album "Pull Marine" in 1983. Supposedly Luc Besson directed the only music video but it doesn't seem to exist on YouTube. *sniffle*
1970s
Bette Davis. Oscared twice over in the 1930s, she continued to rack up nominations through 1962's Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?. She's a bit of a black sheep in this list though because she wasn't trying to start a recording career with her only album. She was nearing 70 years of age when producers asked her and she cut the album "Miss Bette Davis" which includes a few movie songs she's already sung onscreen.
1960s
Patty Duke. She won the supporting actress Oscar at 16 for her co-lead role in The Miracle Worker (1962). Afterwords she got her own television show, recorded albums and had two top forty hits.
1950s
Sal Mineo. First Oscar nominated for Rebel Without a Cause (1955). Released one pop album in 1957 at the heighth of his teen idol fame, from which he even had a top ten single. After that it was all acting again and another nomination for Exodus (1960).
Reader Comments (33)
Abigail Breslin made a cringey pop song last year, too. It was called "You Suck." Saoirse Ronan owes her parents a huge hug.
didn't winslet release a single after an animated movie she did? i want to say a christmas carol?
Seem to remember Jodie Foster recorded a few pop songs in France as a teenager. I believe that was in the same year she got her Oscar nomination for Taxi Driver.
The Jodie Foster French pop songs are AMAZING. If you've never, treat yo self. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GBZPShmya4 and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LCwU0cmn6NY
Patty Duke made a few records after her Oscar win.
John Travolta had a hit with Let Her In, which peaked at No. 10 in 1976.
does Nicole Kidman count, she did a duet with Robbie Williams that was huge in Europe / UK after her Moulin Rouge nomination
Gwyneth Paltrow and Huey Lewis had a radio hit with a cover of Cruising from the Duets soundtrack.
This post is blowing my mind. Brie Larson and Toni Collette released albums? What?
As for Steinfeld - meh. Generic breathy pop voice. Would rather see her acting.
Oh man, I just listened to Larson's "She Said" and really wished I hadn't. That...was not good.
Sissy Spacek!
Many Adjani videos are actually on YouTube!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvoNpentcEw
I will never cease to be amazed by the diversity of Adjani's talents. Brilliant actress, appealing singer, and fluent in several languages (not to mention mesmerizingly gorgeous).
Kate Winslet released that song "What If". There's a music video and everything.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vId_4r925o
brookesboy: Todd in the Shadows pick for the #4 Worst Hit of 1976. As much as I'd disagree with him on Grease and his view that Travolta's singing voice is uniformly terrible (it's really not, especially not in the clip he chose (he sounds like he has the chills, dude, so cut him, and the movie, some slack)), I'd agree that he does have the kind of vocal deficiencies that probably should have stopped anything he did outside of musicals from being a pop hit.
Tbh...this Hailee Steinfeld song has been my jam for the past few days. *hides in shame*
Let's not beat around the bush here - Jennifer Hudson was cast aside as a reality TV reject and it was only AFTER her Oscar win that she launched her pop career. Unfortunately, in my opinion, her current legacy is that she is a mediocre actress and a mediocre popstar. The former will likely never change but the latter can be easily rectified with material deserving of her voice.
The Scarlett Johansson album is perfection.
Came here to make a comment about Patty Duke, but someone else already did.
Let me also echo the sentiments that "Love Myself" is a fun pop ditty, but my goodness, who predicted that this would happen?
@ DJDeeJay
Yeah, Brie Larson is a really gifted actress, but her records/songs are terrible. Thank god she found acting!
Volvagia, I remember first hearing You're the One That I Want, the leadoff single from Grease, on the radio, and remember being shocked Travolta was on the radio. It was only two years after Let Her In was briefly on the airwaves, but that was how forgettable that tune was. I remember it being a lot of breathiness. Dear me.
Look at Hailee getting her pop star on! I ain't mad at ya, gurl! She was actually quite good doing a test run of this in Pitch Perfect 2. Don't hate.
Bette Davis produced an album in the early 70's - did people think this was strange at the time?
Robert Downey Jr. released an album in 2004 called The Futurist.
Ryan Gossling is the lead singer for indie band Dead Man's Bones which I believe started after his nomination.
This is a great post! Isabelle Adjani?!!!
Loved Hailee in Begin Again. Loved everything about that movie. Keira get a record deal!
Does Anna Kendrick count with "Cups"?
@ Henry : how ´bout Anna Kendrick's duet with Jake Gyllenhaal from End Of Watch?
Classic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYn7s97vAdA
Tisk tisk at everyone for forgetting Penelope Cruz was an Oscar winner by 2012 when she released this single with Miguel Bose: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRY-FWTD0jE
In her pre-movie star days she'd also been the muse of one of Spain's greatest musicians Nacho Cano.
Let's not forget Richard Harris' MacArthur Park, before Donna grabbed it.
I like Hailee Steinfeld - and in a far less innocent way than I should like someone that was a "child actor" five years ago but she's legal, so whatever - but the song and video are bland. Certainly not bad by any means but nothing particularly memorable either. She has a good voice, though, so hopefully her next song and video are more interesting.
Henry -- i was going for whole albums, plus Anna Kendrick was recording before Oscar with Broadway Original Soundtracks and such.
Yes, Ryan Gosling's band Dead Man's Bones released their debut album in 2009.
I still wish I hadn't found out that Toni Collette almost was cast as Roxie Hart in the film adaptation of Chicago, especially after hearing her sing. Boy, is Hollywood plum dumb.
Awesome thread!
That was before his Oscar win, but let's not forget Jean Dujardin's "Le Casse de Brice", for French hit "Brice de Nice" in 2005. He also sings it an epic sequence in the movie.
It's a cover of George Benson's "Give Me The Night"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YiUqYK8_swY