3 days til Oscar. Who is the best three time winner?
Thursday, April 22, 2021 at 8:00AM Best Actress predictions change daily but where are we in regards to Frances McDormand's third Best Actress Oscars? Happening or not? I'm tentatively saying it will. That's where my brain is today at least. Frances would be only the seventh actor to manage three Oscars for acting in the 93 years of Academy history and become only the second woman to win three leading Oscars (after Katharine Hepburn).
The others who've won three acting statues:
Fargo (96), Three Billboards (17), Nomadland (20)
- Walter Brennan -Come and Get It (36), Kentucky (38), The Westerner (40) - all in supporting
- Ingrid Bergman -Gaslight (44), Anastasia (56), Murder on the Orient Express (74)
- Katharine Hepburn - Morning Glory (34), Guess Who... (67), Lion in Winter (68), On Golden Pond (81) - all in leading
- Jack Nicholson - One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (75), Terms of Endearment (83), As Good As It Gets (97)
- Meryl Streep - Kramer vs Kramer (79), Sophie's Choice (82), The Iron Lady (11)
- Daniel Day Lewis - My Left Foot (89), There Will Be Blood (07), Lincoln (12) - all in leading
COMMENT PARTY QUESTION: Removing all other performances and movies from your brain (I know it's difficult) how would you rank these six packages of performances?
COMMENT PARTY QUESTION 2: Are there any two-time winners not in the race this year that you could see winning a third?
Reader Comments (75)
Washington and Blanchett are destined for a third acting win.
I'm really unfamiliar with Brennan, Bergman, and Hepburn. Not that I don't know who the latter two are. I just haven't given myself over to pursuing their filmographies.
With Nicholson, Streep, and Day-Lewis -- I dislike one of their three wins. And in all cases it was their third victory that was the least deserving based on merit of the performance.
Too much time on my hands at the moment, so let me take the first stab:
#1
1. Daniel Day-Lewis
2. Katharine Hepburn
3. Ingrid Bergman
4. Meryl Streep
5. Jack Nicholson
6. Walter Brennan
#2
Cate Blanchett, Mahershala Ali, Dianne Wiest, Tom Hanks, Jodie Foster
Based on these wins:
1. Jack Nicholson - I would have voted for all 3 of these
2. Ingrid Bergman - I would have voted for her 2 Lead wins (plus Bells of St Mary's and Autumn Sonata)
3. Meryl Streep - liked her even better in 78, 83, 95, 02, 14 & 17
4. Daniel Day Lewis - loved #1 & #3, hated #2
5. Walter Brennan - #3 is excellent
6. Katherine Hepburn - don't get me wrong, she deserved 4 Oscars, but in 35, 42, 55 & 62. Only her 1st was remotely deserved.
1. Daniel Day Lewis
2. Meryl Streep
3. Ingrid Bergman
4. Jack Nicholson
5. Katherine Hepburn
6. Walter Brennan
Two time winners to a third?
Cate Blanchett. When she followed up Blue Jasmine with Carol, I think a third became more likely than not
!. Nicholson
2. Day Lewis
3. Bergman
4. Hepburn
5. Streep.
I haven't seen all the Brennans, and I intensely dislike The Iron Lady. I think Blanchett and Wiest could win a third.
Daniel Day-Lewis
Meryl Streep
Katharine Hepburn
Jack Nicholson
Ingrid Bergman
Walter Brennan
Most winners on this list have 2 great roles & 1 dud win, but Daniel Day-Lewis is the only one with 3 solid home runs.
Hepburn
Nicholson
Streep
Day-Lewis
Brennan
Bergman
Ali, Blanchett, De Niro, Hanks, Washington and Zellweger
1. Hepburn - I still don’t know my 1968 winner from those two, so I’m fine with the joint win... but I’m basically fine with all four wins.
2. Day Lewis - I’d have voted for the latter two, if not the 1989 win.
3. Bergman - I support the first two wins, and the third is fun.
4. Streep - obviously The Iron Lady is a choice, but the other two are fairly unimpeachable.
5. Brennan - I like them all, but I don’t know all the other nominees.
6. Nicholson - no issue with him having 3 Oscars, but I’d only have voted for Terms of Endearment. I’d vote Al Pacino 1975, and - I don’t like these apples, but - Matt Damon in 1997.
Non-2020/21-nominated two-time winners I could see winning a third:
Denzel Washington, Cate Blanchett, Tom Hanks, Sean Penn. And possibly even a supporting Jane Fonda if they gave her the material.
I'm with Meryl (and I will stand by her third win).
1. Meryl
2. Jack
3. Ingrid
4. Katharine
5. Daniel
6. Walter
Frances and Renee's second wins are just atrocious.
Would love to see Robert DeNiro and Cate Blanchett winning a third.
Where is Glenn's Oscar now?
#1 Hepburn - Nicholson - Day-Lewis - Streep - Bergman
#2 If COVID did not kill you my answer will: Hilary Swank and Renée Zellweger.
Peggy -- now you're just being cruel ;)
Dannyboy -- i could see it for either of them but i dont want it to happen for DeNiro. He's done too much garbage in his career
RobUk -- i keep thinking about Fonda. Like, it's probably not going to happen but if some auteur actually crafted a great supproting role for her i could *totally* see it. Almost every famous auteur doesn't do right by older actresses though.
I agree with others that Cate Blanchett and Denzel Washington probably have the best chance to win a third. Dark horse pick would be Jodie Foster, who just won a major award and is still liked by her peers and still capable of giving a great performance. Another pick would be Maggie Smith. If she announces she is retiring, her last film will have awards thrown at it.
Blanchett certainly seems the likeliest for #3, as many have said. Then there is a deep, deep pool of two time winners who haven't been in the Oscar conversation much recently but still work enough that you could easily see picking up a "career capper" if the right role and set of circumstances emerged:
Denzel
Hanks
Penn
Foster
De Niro
Fonda
Caine
Hoffman
Lange
Weist
I have a hard time seeing it for Swank, Waltz, Zellweger... and certainly Spacey! Ali I think is too soon to say.
Even though she's stuck on one win, I can picture Winslet ending up with 3 Oscars.
In terms of quality of their winning performances, nobody comes close to Daniel Day-Lewis in this bunch (oh how I wish Meryl’s third win was for The Devil Wears Prada, and then she would be right there with him).
I’m in a weird place right now when it comes to Frances this year. I do think she gave the best leading performance this year, but I also don’t know if I want her to win a third when Carey Mulligan doesn’t have an Oscar yet and Viola Davis has never won a best actress Oscar. If Ronan had won for Lady Bird, I would probably be 100 percent team Frances this year. But winning one not long after Three Billboards (when she practically begged voters not to vote for her) seems like overkill.
As for who else can win three, I agree with everyone that the obvious answers might be Denzel, Cate and Mahershala, but I could also see Michael Caine getting one last prestige supporting role, I don’t know. Ditto Dianne Wiest in 10 years or so. But I think something this awards season showed is how much awards bodies will be willing to award Jodie Foster for a real comeback vehicle. So I guess my answer is Jodie.
Denzel will probably win a third.
a. My rank. Can't judge Walter Brennan, haven't seen any of those movies.
Daniel Day Lewis
Katharine Hepburn
Ingrid Bergman
Meryl Streep
Jack Nicholson
b. I could say for sure Cate Blanchett and Denzel Washington will get a third one. Sean Penn is a good guess also. Jane Fonda would be a personal pick,
Easily Jack and Daniel. Jack's 3 were all for playing variations of Jack, but he should have won them all. Daniel's first Oscar was totally deserving, but Tom Cruise and Morgan Freeman (despite the criticism the film receives) each have an argument. But the second and third wins were so clear.
Meryl shouldn't have won her last, but her first two were unbelievable. Sophie's Choice is on the shortlist.
Those are the top standouts.
1. Hepburn
2. Streep
3. Nicholson
4. Day-Lewis
5. Bergman
6. Brennan
I could see a scenario where soon a third Oscar lands in the lap of one those British two timers from the early days of New Hollywood - Glenda Jackson or Maggie Smith.
1. Katharine Hepburn
2. Katharine Hepburn
3. Katharine Hepburn
4. Jack Nicholson
5. Daniel Day Lewis
6. Ingrid Bergman
7. Walter Brennan
8. Meryl Streep
Daniel
Hepburne
Jack
Ingrid
Walter
Meryl
Removing all other performances and movies from your brain (I know it's difficult) how would you rank these six packages of performances?
#1 K Hepburn
#2 W Brennan
#3 J Nicholson
#4 I Bergman
#5 D Day Lewis
#6 M Streep
Q= Are there any two-time winners not in the race this year that you could see winning a third?
A= Michael Caine
Q1)
Katharine Hepburn
Jack Nicholson
Ingrid Bergman
Walter Brennan
Daniel Day Lewis
Meryl Streep
Q2)
Glenda Jackson and Jessica Lange
I went with Day-Lewis, because he's the only one whose 3 wins were probably the best of their respective years.
I think McDormand will take it this year too.
Jack Nicholson
Katharine Hepburn
Ingrid Bergman
Daniel Day Lewis
Walter Brennan
Meryl Streep
Tom Hanks
1. Meryl Streep
2. Day Lewis
3. Katharine Hepburn
4. Jack Nicholson
5. Ingrid Bergman
I wish Daniel Day Lewis would win a fourth one. Also La Streep with a performance is that seals her great art.
Hopefully Cate Blanchett will join the club.
Not even funny. Kate. That's why she has 4.
I haven't seen Brennan, but here's my rankings:
1. Daniel Day Lewis - I don't even love Lincoln, but what a trio of rich performances.
2. Jack Nicholson
3. Katharine Hepburn - three good wins and one "eh" win.
4. Meryl Streep - if they'd given her the award for almost any other nom, even Doubt, she would be competitive with Nicholson.
5. Ingrid Bergman - she's my favorite actor of this group, but man was her Orient Express win bad.
I think Denzel will win a third. He's good, still bankable, and very likeable. Cate Blanchett will too. I also think she's coming up at a time where the roles for women in their 50s are more complex than what women like Glenn Close and Julianne Moore were offered.
I think both Maggie and Jane Fonda have one more nomination in them - and they both came pretty close recently. I think if the moment is right, they could pick up supporting trophies. Maggie's new project, A German Life, sounds like a really winner and could do well if her campaigners use her Downton Abbey 2 popularity and the public's love for her correctly.
I'm looking forward to Meryl's fourth. :-)
Second question:
If De Niro gets the right part...
C Blanchett (safest bet)
If Hoffman gets the right part...
M Ali
D Washington
J Foster (maybe, if she lives long enough and gets the kind of role Ingrid Bergman got in MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS.)
R Zellweger could surprise if she lives long enough. They won't give her another one anytime soon, though.
S. Penn (mayyyyyyyy be).
These are all seat-of-the-pants predictions
... and at the risk of people jumping at my neck, there's an actress that should have 4 (2 leads, 2 supporting) and was never even nominated, despite being a member of the AMPAS and having worked with Coppola and del Toro, among others, and co-starred in one Best Foreign Film winner.
Maribel Verdú.
Supporting: Amantes (1991). With all respect to Mercedes Ruehl, only counting her final scene, the Oscar should have gone to Verdú.
Lead: La Buena Estrella (1997) , in a 3-way acting duel with Antonio Resines and Jordi Mollá, exploiting to perfection her weaker and also stronger side. Helen Hunt won that year, in a good to great performance but that can't hold a candle to Verdú's
Lead: Y tu mamá también (2002). We all know that Kidman won for a Supporting Role as a compensation for her double snub of the year before for "The Others" (not even nominated) and Moulin Rouge!. Regretfully, IFC Films - if I remember correctly - decided to push Mia Vardalos for Lead and buried Verdú's chances completely of even a nomination.
Supporting: Pan's Labyrinth (El Laberinto del Fauno, 2006). I mean, just watch the film. The only explanation I see for her absence was the combo of genre bias + foreign language performance... but looking at the quintet - sorry, Cate - I think Verdú easily beats in complexity and final delivery, her performance.
Of course that's subjective, but she's probably one of the most underreated performers in the planet, at this point.
I'm thinking McDormand won't win #3, personally. Looking over the list of 3-time winners, there are usually circumstances in play that aren't in McDormand's case this year:
- Brennan: probably our first instance of a category fraud win, played a real person
- Hepburn: broke the all-time acting nomination record with her 11th (beating Bette Davis's 10)
- Bergman: this is the anomaly; weak year for the category and her closest competitor was a foreign language performance
- Nicholson: broke the men's all-time acting nomination record with his 11th (beating Olivier's 10)
- Streep: broke the all-time acting nomination record for the 5th time, biopic role
- Day-Lewis: year-in-advance front-runner, biopic role
1. Nicholson.
2. Day Lewis (would be 1 if he won for Phantom Thread instead of Lincoln)
3. Streep (would easily be 1 with almost any other of her roles as her third win)
4. Hepburn
5. Bergman
6. Brennan by default as I've sadly seen none of those films.
Almost definitely a future 3rd for Blanchett. Hanks is likely, especially if he gets a "The Father" type role in his later years. Wiest is my wishful thinking.
Go get that third, Frances!
DDL is the worthiest three-time winner.
She has one Oscar at present, but Jennifer Lawrence is an actress I can see winning three trophies in her career because AMPAS has already demonstrated they will nominate and or award her for any awards bait project (even if the film is rough, the role is undemanding, or the performance uneven). When you reach that level of worldwide fame and blind adoration, the path to multiple trophies becomes easier; she could be like Jane Fonda and win a second in the next few years for a minor performance like 'Coming Home.'
Denzel has to be the current two-time winner most likely to win a third someday, but I think there’s a solid chance Mahershala Ali could win a third someday as well. It probably won’t be for a long time since I think giving him a third soon when he just won his first one 4 years ago would seem like overkill to most people (plus his second win wasn’t exactly popular), but give it 15, 20 years, and yeah, I could definitely see him winning a third Oscar.
Not to move away from the “3” theme, but I also definitely think Meryl will win a fourth someday, and if Daniel Day-Lewis comes out of retirement again, I could also see him getting a fourth.
1.Daniel Day-Lewsi
2.Meryl Streep
3.Ingrid Bergman
4.Jack Nicholson
5.Katharine Hepburn
6.Walter Brennan
Q2: Cate Blanchett/Denzel Washington
1. Hepburn - She's great in all her wins!
2. Bergman - I think she should have three even if two of those wins aren't great films
3. Meryl Streep - Like Bergman, Meryl should have three Oscars but one of those wins isn't good
4. Nicholson - Terms of Endearment win is silly but he's another that's great in bad films
5. DDL - I only like one of his wins. The others are nonsense.
6. Brennan - his wins were from the extras loving him & is the reason extras were banned from voting.
Denzel feels like somebody that should have a third. I would've awarded him for Fences. I'd love for Jane Fonda to score a third.
1. Daniel Day-Lewis
2. Meryl Streep
3. Ingrid Bergman
4. Katharine Hepburn
5. Jack Nicholson
n/a Walter Brennan (haven't seen any of them)
I can see Blanchett, and maybe Hanks and Washington winning a third. I actually wouldn't be surprised at this point if Zellweger also wins a third. Who would have thought she would win a second with the post-Cold Mountain career she had?
1) DDL is the only one of them where I love all three performances.
2) Glenda Jackson filming "Three Tall Women" and winning in the comeback performance of the century! (I imagine someone is trying to make this happen!)
Q1: Daniel Day-Lewis by a landslide
Q2: Cate Blanchett. She was close to get that 3rd one with Carol. So it is just a matter of time. Blanchett is going to get a 10+ nomination streak
Dark horses:
Christian Bale. Though with only 1 win, he could get 2 more. He keeps getting nominated and getting buzz for almost all his roles.
Jodie Foster. The next time she is getting nominated, Foster will be the front runner.
Ranking:
1) Day-Lewis: All 3 of Daniel Day-Lewis' performances are top-notch (though I am tempted to give Tom Cruise the Oscar in 1990)
2) Ingrid Bergman: deserves 3 Oscars. Murder on the Orient Express is not a bad win-I just would have preferred Madeleine Kahn.
3) Katherine Hepburn: First two were deserved and the second two were strong sentimental choices
4) Jack Nicholson: His performances are all good, but I have small problems with each (Pacino should have won in 1976, Charles Durning in 1984, and he held back in As Good As It Gets to make Hunt look better)
5) Walter Brennan: Fine performances
6) Meryl Streep: First two performances are classics, but that third has "give her the Oscar already so we can ignore her again."
Denzel Washington is very close to a third. Possibly, Tom Hanks (but he is overlooked a lot) and because I have seen her acting recently Glenda Jackson.
DDL he won for all the right roles and I to have moved from Davis back to Frances,sorry as great as Mulligan is some voters won't like her.
There's a dog in the bunch in almost all of these, (Iron Lady and As Good as it Gets particularly)
Obviously, the # 1 can only be Hepburn.
2)Day-Lewis
3) Streep
4) Nicholson (Streep and Nicholson can easily switch)
5) Bergman
6) Brennan, for the reasons mentioned above.
1. Daniel Day-Lewis
2. Meryl Streep ( maybe no for The Iron Lady, a big YES for Kramer x Kramer and Sophie’s Choice )
3. Jack Nicholson ( no for One Flew..., I prefer Al Pacino in Dog Day Afternoon)
4. Ingrid Bergman ( no for Murder on The Orient Express)
5. Katherine Hepburn ( no for Guess... and On Golden Pond)
I can’t say anything about Walter Brennan, I am not familiar with his work.
Next three time winners : Frances, Denzel, Cate, maybe Maggie and Jodie.
Jesús, read the room. A little too VIVA ESPAÑA.
Ooh, love ranking!
1. Daniel Day-Lewis - I love all of these. Great wins.
2. Katharine Hepburn - The Lion in Winter is an all time great, and I love her in On Golden Pond. Less excited about the first two.
3. Meryl Streep - The first two are all time greats, but the third is a real bummer.
4. Jack Nicholson - I love him in As Good As It Gets, but I'm not sure it's aged well. I don't love him in the other two.
5. Ingrid Bergman - Gaslight is easily the best. She was fine in Orient Express and I don't get the Anastasia love. Too bad, because I love her in general.
6. Walter Brennan - Seen them all and I suppose The Westerner is his best, but don't love any of them.