She Had Oscar Buzz!
Wednesday, September 25, 2019 at 9:30AM
Yes, the title is an homage to our friends podcast "This Had Oscar Buzz". Here's a piece from new contributor Elie Chivi that we think you'll love on women who strangely haven't been nominated yet...
by Elie Chivi
After Kirsten Dunst’s comments last month about the relative lack of awards attention she’s received throughout her career, I couldn’t help but think of the many other never-nominated yet deserving actresses of the past couple of decades. Some actresses can get Oscar nominations for doing the bare minimum (think Frances McDormand in North Country or Catherine Keener in Capote) due to a mix of bandwagoning on to a bigger lead performance or simply because of who they are.
On the other hand, some of our finest actresses consistently do interesting, complex, or hilarious work yet always come up short on Oscar nomination morning. From the crop of post-90’s era performers, the list below highlights five of the most egregious members of the never-nominated list...
KIRSTEN DUNST
Most realistic chances at Oscar nominations
• Interview With The Vampire: Globe nom, Critics Group noms (Boston, Chicago, Dallas Fort Worth)
• Melancholia: Cannes Best Actress win, National Society of Film Critics Awards win, Critics group noms (Chicago, LA, NYC, Dallas Fort Worth nom)
Never had a chance but is also good in: Bring It On, The Virgin Suicides, Marie Antoinette, Bachelorette (one of the most underrated comedies that had the unfortunate luck of coming out riiiiight after the somewhat but not really similar Bridesmaids), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Drop Dead Gorgeous, The Beguiled, and Crazy/Beautifu.
Kirsten Dunst has been so good for so long. Her subtle, unshowy work has caused the industry to take her for granted for over twenty years now. Her brilliance is either completely overlooked come awards season or overshadowed by controversy (Melancholia and that awful press conference). A pivot to TV (Fargo, On Becoming a God in Central Florida) might be where she’ll finally find the recognition she deserves.
SCARLETT JOHANSSON
Most realistic chances at Oscar nominations
• Lost In Translation: Globe nom, BAFTA win, Venice win, Critics Group wins (LA, Boston) Critics group noms (Broadcast, Pheonix, Vancouver)
• Girl With A Pearl Earring: Globe nom, BAFTA nom, British Independent Film Awards win, LA win shared with Lost In Translation, Critics group noms (Pheonix)
• Match Point: Globe nom, Critics group noms (Chicago, Dallas)
Never had a chance but is also good in: Under The Skin, Her
Johansson may be problematic and mind-boggingly tone deaf in interviews and about the scope of roles she thinks she should be allowed to play, but her performances as an alien in Under The Skin and computer software in Her kiiiiiiiiind of make me think that maybe she should be able to play any tree or animal she wants? (Just kidding, someone please save this woman from herself.)
Regardless, It still blows the mind that the studios behind Translation and Earring didn’t quite figure out a way to campaign ScarJo in separate categories in 2003 (Category fraud is very much frowned upon at TFE but in situations like these, we know how the studios like to play it). Thankfully, she won’t have that problem this year with a lead role in Marriage Story and an actual supporting turn in Jojo Rabbit both earning early raves.
CAMERON DIAZ
Most realistic chances at Oscar nominations
• Theres Something About Mary: Globe nom, New York Film Critics Circle Award (lol)
• Being John Malkovich: Globe nom, BAFTA nom, SAG nom, Critics group noms (Las Vegas)
• Vanilla Sky: Globe nom, SAG nom, Critics Group wins (Boston, Chicago), Critics Group noms (Broadcast, Dallas Fort Worth, Pheonix)
Never had a chance but is also good in: My Best Friend’s Wedding, In Her Shoes
The fact that Diaz received Globe, BAFTA, and SAG noms for Malkovich and then got Globe and SAG noms for Sky within a two year span at the height of her career (Charlie’s Angels was released in between them!) is insane. Nominations for both or either would’ve been the perfect kind of “moment” the Academy loves to create. This will never not be a head scratcher.
JENNIFER ANISTON
Most realistic chances at Oscar nominations
• The Good Girl: Indie Spirit nom
• Cake: Globe nom, SAG nom, BFCA nom
Never had a chance but is also good in: Friends With Money
We all know how close she was to making it in for Cake in 2014 but had 2002 not been such a crazy good year for female lead performances Aniston would’ve had serious traction for The Good Girl. She had just won an Emmy for Friends, and was in peak Brad & Jen phase. She might have pulled through had the movie been bigger. Her general knack for making terrible movies has tarnished her brand as an actress but hopefully The Morning Show can bring some of that magic back.
EMILY BLUNT
Most realistic chances at Oscar nominations
• The Devil Wears Prada: Globe nom, BAFTA nom, Critics Group noms (Dallas Fort Worth)
• A Quiet Place SAG win, Critics Group noms (Central Ohio, ST Louis)
• Mary Poppins Returns: Globe nom, SAG nom, BFCA nom, Critics Group noms (Central Ohio)
• Into The Woods: Globe nom, Critics Group nom (London)
• The Young Victoria: Globe nom, BFCA nom, Critics Group noms (Dallas Fort Worth, London)
• The Girl on the Train: SAG nom, BAFTA nom
Never had a chance but is also good in: Sicario, Edge of Tomorrow
From the moment she nearly stole Prada from Meryl Streep, Emily Blunt has almost been nominated for an Oscar a handful of times. From her surprise A Quiet Place SAG win to the even more surprising attention given for her work in mediocre films (Victoria and Train), Emily Blunt is clearly loved by the industry. At this point, she’ll likely need to star in a major Best Picture nominee to make it in which is exactly what we all thought was going to happen with Mary Poppins Returns although yet again... nothing for her or the movie.
Which one of these women's never-nominated status most perplexes you and why?
Reader Comments (84)
Love Dunst, Johansson, Diaz, and Blunt, but Aniston has never been even remotely nomination worthy.
Kirsten because how long she is in this business doing great work (My nominations: supporting - Interview with the vampire, Eternal Sunshine; Leading: Marie Antoinette, Melancholia)
and ScarJo because she is a star since her great role (My nominations: supporting - Match Point, Her; Leading - Lost in translation, Under the Skin)
But, Emily makes me think the same too! (My nominations: supporting - Devil wears Prada; Leading: Sicario, Edge of Tomorrow, Mary Poppins Returns)
As much as I enjoy and respect Diaz, Dunst, and Aniston's work, I can think of reasons tied to the year or the film and see why they haven't made it in. But Blunt not getting nominated for Prada and Johansson not getting nominated for Lost in Translation, those two misses are just bizarre and I have to wonder what the studios were doing (or not doing).
And as far as I'm concerned we can never talk about Bachelorette and Dunst in Bachelorette enough. Always happy to see it/her highlighted here.
Elie, fun article and lots of work putting it together...thanks!
Cameron Diaz was so fun in her prime.
Looking over all those performances, though, is any of them actually GREAT? Lots of really, really good work in there, but I can see how each one just didn't quite make the final five (of course it's arguable that several are BETTER than ones that actually did get nominated, of course).
I think in Kirsten Dunst's case, a lot of it is reputation...she had many years in her younger career where she was, um, not warm. When I worked with her, she was awful. It seems that's changed, thankfully. I do think Interview and Melancholia are her two best performances.
So funny - I was just thinking about this yesterday! Read my mind... a couple others (some a bit older but still active):
Jamie Lee Curtis
Robin Wright
Meg Ryan
Thandie Newton
would add Gangs of New York to Cameron's list!
On the men's side of the ledger:
Jim Carrey
Hugh Grant
Richard Gere
Colin Farrell
John Goodman
Kevin Bacon
Steve Buscemi
Ewan MacGregor
John Cusack
Alfred Molina
Idris Elba
Steve Martin...
So much good work out there, makes you realize what a shame these "autopilot" noms for some people are.
"Johansson may be problematic and mind-boggingly tone deaf in interviews and about the scope of roles she thinks she should be allowed to play..."
Ridiculous...this kind of pile-on is going to make Best Actress insufferable. Scarlett doesn't speak in Twitter-approved talking points but she's a charming person and undeniably excellent actress who doesn't deserve to be reduced to "problematic." And no, you're not required to provide that little asterisk before you go on to say nice things about her. You can just not.
For what it's worth, the "controversial project" she defended her involvement in (for having the audacity to suggest that, as an actress, she "act"), may never get made! Turns out making perfect the enemy of the good means less representation for everybody.
Wow it blows my mind that Cameron Diaz didn’t get an Oscar nomination for Vanilla Sky!! I still think she was nominated every time I remember this performance. She’s so scary good in this!
Ironic to have Johansson next to Diaz since Lost in Translation was taking pretty direct shots at Diaz's career.
Dunst was also terrific in Little Women.
Aniston's Cake never did anything for me but I loved her in The Good Girl.
I have a feeling Dunst is coming for the Emmy next season, but the lady most likely to be Oscar nominated first is probably Blunt.
Scarlett Johansson in 2003.
Love Dunst, Johansson, Diaz, and Blunt, but Aniston has never been even remotely nomination worthy.
@Tyler: I tend to agree. I guess Aniston had Oscar buzz for The Good Girl, if you count the low droning sound of fans who feel that a performance that was simply Not Rachel Green was enough to merit a nomination.
I’m normally dismissive of Diaz as well, but this article has made me rethink her career somewhat. While I still don’t equate her with prestige, I will acknowledge that she has been part of some interesting projects.
Keener is great in Capote and no one was critical of that nomination at the time, I don't care what kind of revisionist history is implied above.
Yeah. Johannson in 2003. She was amazing in two movies. One had a much higher profile. Best actress was super weak after Theron and Keaton (in terms of profile). But they tried to push her in supporting for a little while than switched. I think that hurt.
Peggy - True. Also 2005
Dunst certainly gave one of the best supporting performances in 94 if not 1 of the all time gr8 child performances but the film she was in probably hindered her.
Fantastic in Melancholia esp how she sells the empty vessel that comes with debilitating depression.
For me I think her greatest performance is in All Good Things,watch the mirror scene and tell me otherwise,she ages infront of that mirror with just her face,she is so devastingly tragic,you should check it out.
Peter is right.
Yas! I always wanted this list @ TFE. It's The Myrna Loy club I once wished in an old comment. Thank you! Please give us the Edward G. Robinson club soon.
The bare minimum was what Emma Stone did in La La Land and Octavia Spencer in Shape of Water.
Dunst should have won for Melancholia!
I like some of the older choices who really should have had 1 or maybe 2 noms by now
Curtis in 83,88,94,03
Ryan 89,94 or 96
I think Diaz suffered because of the less pretigious films and her retirement sort of proves she knew that she couldn't do that sort of thing forever but I wouldn't rule out a Renee style comeback.
Scarlett should have been in the line ups of 2003 but many thought she was lead so maybe she split her votes thus snubbed.
I am not a fan of her Match Point work,really enjoy her in Don Jon though so breezy and smart in that.
Blunt is a puzzle constistently good esp in 2006 and 2015 for SIcario,I don't know what it is she has to do,I was 100 per cent sure MPR was her 1st then nothing and doesn't the SAG win seem odd with no Oscar nom..
Good call, Pete. The grandaddy of them all is Donald Sutherland, though. It's really a shame he's never been nominated.
I would argue that Blunt's performance in The Devil Wears Prada is great - easily one of my favorite supporting actress performances of the '00s. I know why she missed (comedy is ignored by the Academy), but she should have won that year.
Check your facts, Anonny. It was "problematic" for a white actress like her to play a Japanese character (anime or no) in Ghost in the Shell, so it's not just Rub and Tug. Add to that her (largely unsolicited) comments about Woody Allen, Marchesa, etc., and the woman begs to incite controversy...which is her prerogative! It's also the public's or individual's prerogative to push back and voice his or her own opinion.
@markgordonuk, I love Dunst in All Good Things! 2010 was a ridiculously stacked year, but she certainly made a case for herself (and definitely did in 2011, but that's another story altogether). Also, if Dunst's performance in Interview with the Vampire came out in the '70s, I wonder if she'd have had a better shot at getting nominated, since the Academy seemed much kinder to child performances (and horror/suspense films) in that decade.
The fact that Focus campaigned Johansson as supporting in 2003 is absurd, and it probably cost her the nomination as I think she actually had a better shot at a Best Actress nomination for Lost in Translation, vs. the late-breaking Girl with the Pearl Earring (wonderful though she is in both).
As the resident Anne Heche stan up in here, I'd put her in place of Jennifer Aniston, whom I don't think really ever came as close to an Oscar nom as it may seem. Heche, meanwhile, had both Donnie Brasco and Wag the Dog in 1997, Return to Me in '98, and Birth in '04, although the latter was going nowhere with Oscar. (Their loss!)
Loved "Melancholia". And Dunst was good in it. But the performances that linger in my mind came from Charlotte Gainsbourg and Kiefer Sutherland (not to mention Udo Kier's hilarious cameo as a perpetually aggrieved party planner).
Have never seen a full episode of "Friends" but based on her big screen work I like Jennifer Aniston just fine. Except for her, "Just Go With it" is is a dim bulb of a movie, but she somehow manages to display sustained Jean Arthur level comic perfection in it. And I loved her in "The Good Girl" and "Cake"
Emily Blunt's solid - the best thing in "Into the Woods". And breathtakingly good - simultaneously intense and restrained - in Joe Johnston's under-rated "The Wolfman"
I've enjoyed Cameron Diaz in a couple of things ("Bad Teacher", "The Counselor") but have never seen anything from her that made me think "Give that girl an Oscar". Still , she regularly gives off fun, likeable good sport vibes, on and off-screen..
Took a long time to embrace Scarlett Johansson. Still don't get all the buzz about her as some great beauty. But she can definitely act. And boy is she sensational in "Don Jon"! I'd have definitely given her the supporting actress trophy for that one.
I know she's not as active in the west anymore, but what Zhang Ziyi , she came close at least twice with Crouching Tiger and Memoirs of a Geisha
*what about that meant to read.
I think Heche got saddled with "problematic" in the late 90's and her film work dried up,can't say she has wowed me anything but The Juror but that's a bad movie anyway so your looking for any bright spot.
Johansson in Under the Skin, so good. Kirstin Dunst in like, everything I've seen her in. She is just tragically underrated. Aniston, I like her but see her as a likable comedienne - nothing she's done so far as screamed Oscar to me.
I don't know why big directors aren't dying to put Dunst in their projects. That means you, Villeneuve, Valle, Innaritu, Wes Anderson, P.T. Anderson, Fincher, Nolan, Russell, Aronofsky, Guadagnino, Coens, Lanthimos, McQueen, Scorsese...
Is there any doubt at all that she would slay a performance in any of those directors' filmographies? They would not regret it.
Emily Blunt and Kirsten Dunst not being nominated is quite perplexing.
Emily Blunt because she could it been not just an Oscar nominated but actually a winner for The Devil Wears Prada
I can imagine Dunst and Johansson with at least one nomination until this moment but Aniston and Diaz....i don´t see them as Oscar material considering the competition of the years they could it been nominated.
I wrote a post on this site about actors needing their first nominations and Dunst and Johansson were both on it! It was written 5 years ago! But hope is not lost. I also included Charlotte Rampling and Isabelle Huppert and both have received nominations since then!
http://thefilmexperience.net/blog/2014/1/21/tuesday-top-ten-working-actors-in-need-of-an-oscar-nominatio.html
Jennifer Anniston always plays herself. This not a shocker to me anyway. I could see any of the others winning at some point, but it's very hard to win an Oscar.
I never understand how people really believed "Mary Poppins Returns" was an Oscar contender in the main categories. Sequels, especially with a long time don't tend to go well at the Oscars, the genre is anti Oscars (children fantasy) and then when the first one was released we need to remember that was event of the decade (and the cherry of the cake, Julie Andrews narrative after being rejected for Jack Warner and the Marni Nixon scandal). It was one of those "one time deal".
Anyway, Scarjo may have her Oscar nom(s) this season, Blunt probably next... The others no so sure.
I think we will be adding Jennifer Lopez to this list next year. I don't think she will get in for Hustlers and she also got traction for Selena. However she will still get invited and will be the best dressed. Like Anniston and Taraji P Henson showing up looking better than everyone else is the best revenge.
Maaaan, Catherine Keener was a waste in Capote. Crazy thing is Sandra Bullock had more to do in Infamous where they actually fleshed out Harper Lee. I just pretend Keener's nomination was for "40 Year Old Virgin".
I' knew as soon I saw Aniston's name, the comments were gonna light up to take her down. I'd have given her Hayek's spot in 2002 and Felicity Jones spot in 2014. She'd have also been in play for me for "Dumplin'" and "Marley and Me". I also like her in "Derailed".
Diaz is in that rare group of actors who was nominated at both SAG + Golden Globes and yet still didn't make the Oscar cut -- TWICE!
She is so so good in Being John Malkovich.. if Keener wasn't also nominated, dare I say she should've won, too.
Why the Keener is Capote shade she is subtle,lived in,funny.
Cameron Diaz does not even act anymore. Why would she win an Oscar?
Speaking of actresses and oscars, what ever happened to the 1957 Smackdown? Is that podcast going to happen, or no?
Cameron Diaz should have been cast in those roles that Russell kept giving to Jennifer Lawrence, especially American Hustle. I'm fairly certain that's the kind of opportunity that would have gotten her a nod.
Emily Blunt's problem is that she's positioned herself as a go-to studio actress. She exceeds expectations in very mainstream commercial movies—musicals, comedies, action, horror. Her movies do well but it's a very middlebrow filmography.
She deserves (and receives) credit for her range, but she seems more like a producer's actress than a director's actress.
OMG Cameron Diaz playing Jennifer Lawrence's role in American Hustle would have been perfect.
@Troy H., Diaz in American Hustle would have been magic. I think she's a great actress, and she would have delivered a brillant star turn in that role and swept through awards season easily. It still boggles my mind that she missed for Malkovich and Sky.
Cake was terrible. But Anniston was so so good in the Good Girl. She really needs to find a role like that again - not baity but that pushes her as an actress. 2002 was a banner year for Actresses, but she would have been a worthy contender as a nominee.
Troy.H
Oh yes! Cameron Diaz in American Hustle with Christian Bale would have been epic!
Emily Blunt is for me the closest one. Rooting for her to finally get a nomination
I dig Aniston but she's an odd choice for this list. Not much range and she's never tried to stretch very far outside her comfort zone. Cake was kinda terrible.
If we're sticking with English-language actresses (and not, say, Bibi Andersson or Maggie Cheung), I'd make a case for Sarah Paulson (12 Years a Slave, Carol), Pam Grier (Jackie Brown would have made a worthy career recognition), Thandie Newton (Beloved and, yes, Crash) and Rene Russo (she doesn't do a lot of awards bait but Nightcrawler was a serious oversight).
Diaz was excellent in Being John Malkovich. It's a weird film to be sure—don't get me wrong, I love it—but the cast is fine all around, with Diaz, Keener and Malkovich himself as the standouts. Such a shame that she was never nominated, but I guess we always will have her iconic, silly over-the-shoulder bit when she and Lopez presented together at the Oscars.
@abstew
I searched the post you mention and i realize that even some of your honorable mention choices are Oscar nominees now.
Can you do a post about actors in need for an Oscar WIN for make it happen?
Emily Blunt = Donald Sutherland
Kirsten Dunst should have had a nomination for Melancholia, but her director kept saying such stupid things that the film didn't get the respect and awards attention it deserved.
Focus Features actually did campaign Scarlett as Supporting for LOST IN TRANSLATION. :|
awww.... i thought frances mcdormand was great in NORTH COUNTRY, that's not bare minimum. :(
thumbs up to cameron diaz. i know i may be in the minority, but THE COUNSELOR was so so so good, and she deserves props for swinging for the fences with that role. delightfully sinister.
Agree with Peter regarding Catherine Keener in 'Capote'. She is excellent.