Best Supporting Actor - Strongest Lineup in Years?
Wednesday, January 29, 2025 at 9:00AM by Nathaniel R
Jeremy Strong and Sebastian Stan in THE APPRENTICE © Briarcliff Entertainment
It's that time when you should start voting on the chart polls of "who SHOULD win?" We all know Kieran Culkin has the "supporting" Oscar locked up for his moody insightfulness and purposefully too-much lead performance in A Real Pain. But can we pause for a moment to appreciate that, Category Fraud aside, this is the best Best Supporting Actor lineup we've had in ages. There's not a bad or solid-but-unexciting performance in the bunch, just excellence across the board. Because I was so stunned at the quality of the shortlist, I had to look back through Oscar history to find its equivalent - a year wherein there's not a single performance nominated that would look bad as a winner. I think you have to go back thirty years to either 1995 or 1993 to find a lineup as consistently strong. This message has been brought to you by a post-nomination viewing of The Apprentice a film I'd been avoiding for trauma reasons around the death of democracy. Strong is just excellent in the awards magnet role of Roy Cohn, a role that's already won Al Pacino an Emmy and Nathan Lane a Tony (both via Angels in America). Strong is so good that it's legitimately surprising that he's not even third best in the category...
The day after the nominations I met a friend at Julius (NYC's oldest gay bar) and just before I arrived a multi-table conversation with strangers had commenced in which everyone opined that Denzel Washington was robbed. But was he? It's hard to complain about this lineup no matter how much you loved Denzel's "are you not entertained" style showboating in Gladiator II, or Clarence Maclin's moving self-portrait in Sing Sing, or Adam Pearson's charm offensive in A Different Man, or the perpetually overlooked John Magaro's film carrying work in September 5 to name the four actors we assume came closest to crashing this party. Even Denzel probably knows it's fire. This won't match my lineup of course (since Culkin won't be eligible for "Supporting") but it'll come much MUCH closer than this category ever does. To prove the point here's how closely my ballot aligned with Oscars in this category in the past twelve years.
2023: 2/5
2022: 3/5
2021: 2/5
2020: 1/5
2019: 2/5... or you can say 3/5 if you're feeling generous. The actual supporting Oscar winner (Brad Pitt in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood) was nominated in lead at the film bitch awards so he was still accounted for.
2018: 2/5
2017: 1/5
2016: 1/5
2015: 1/5
2014: 3/5
2013: 2/5
2012: 1/5
Years in bold are the only times the winner aligned; You'll notice that there are no years in bold, LOL.
As per usual there is trivia and anecdotes on the charts. And as per usual as I was writing this I imagined a fusion of the entire shortlist into one Frankenstein Monster Supporting Actor. The stitched together creature would be a married 40something Scorpio actor from Boston with two kids. He's been working as a professional actor since 1990 and you probably recognize him from the HBO series Succession. Take a look at the chart and vote daily.
Reader Comments (21)
My curiosity was piqued by your comparison between Oscar and Film Bitch. So here's how AMPAS' lineup compares to "My Oscars" (following the Academy's eligibility lists):
2024: 0/5
2023: 0/5
2022: 2/5
2021: 0/5
2020: 0/5
2019: 1/5 (or 2/5 since I nominated Hanks in lead)
2018: 1/5
2017: 0/5
2016: 0/5
2015: 0/5
2014: 2/5
2013: 0/5
2012: 0/5
No wonder I'm never happy with the Oscars lineups. Oh well.
Well now I want to know every nominee since 1995 that would look bad as a winner lol.
I probably won't see The Apprentice (who knows, maybe I'll change my mind), but I'm in love with the nominations for Pearce, Borisov and Norton. I also think Washington was robbed - but I wouldn't want him to replace any of those 3.
I just don't think Culkin is all that good - Eisenberg is much stronger IMO.
Hm, don't know that I agree. Top-notch lineups in 2002, 2007, and 2008, for instance.
Also, Richard Roundtree was robbed. And Antonio Banderas.
Wae: I was going to mention 2002, too! I've always been fond of it, but I don't think everyone loves Ed Harris in The Hours.
Quick correction to make on the Supporting Actor page: you said Guy Pearce had only been in one previous Best Picture nominee (LA Confidential), but he also later appeared in two consecutive Best Picture winners: The Hurt Locker and The King's Speech.
I’m kinda partial to 2008 (Ledger, Brolin, Downey Jr., Hoffman, Shannon) and 2010 (Bale, Hawkes, Renner, Ruffalo, Rush). Category fraud notwithstanding (for the most part less egregious than this year).
I agree on 93 being very strong but 95 is weak in my opinion outside of Spacey who would have been worthy for Seven also.
Cromwell Roth Harris and Pitt are fine but nothing more and none of them would have been a good winner.
My own line up in 95 is radically different with only Spacey surviving adding Don Cheadle in Devil In A Blue Dress,Joaquin Phoenix in To Die For,John Leguizamo in To Wong Foo and Kenneth Branagh in Othello.
With big respect to Brian Cox and John Hurt in Rob Roy,Raymond J Barry in Dead Man Walking,Kevin Bacon in Murder In The First,Kevin Spacey in Seven,Dennis Farina in Get Shorty and James Woods in Casino
For my money these 12 men are all way above the 4 nominees who lost to Spacey.
I second FrankZappa's mention of the 2010 line up for being very strong.
Nathaniel, I agree that this is one of our very, very best SA line-ups. Possibly our very best ever???
I agree with Wae Mest that 2007 was really strong (Affleck/Bardem/Hoffman/Holbrook/Wilkinson), but before that I would also go back to the infamous 1993 group.
While I think Norton is the weakest this year, any of these gents would make a worthy winner over time. I really wish Guy Pearce had a better shot...he's magnificent.
Also, small thing, but Ron Leibman also won the Tony for Best Actor playing Roy Cohn in the original production of Angels in America. He was insanely good.
I was blown away by Pearce in The Brutalist.
Funny how the last strong supporting lineup also had Norton in it. The Boyhood/Birdman year.
I'm glad Denzel had fun wearing a robe and jewelry, but he didn't needed/deserved to be nominated.
Sad Tucci couldn't make it. We must erase that Lovely Bones nomination.
Agree on the great lineup, only marred by the Culkin category fraud. It's a shame because he would have been nominated for Best Actor if voters and critics groups weren't such sheep, opening a spot for Denzel, Maclin, Eydelshteyn, or one of the Conclave guys (Carlos Diehz deserved more love).
It's funny – on a human level, I wonder if Borisov's performance is more attributable to Sean Baker's directing and editing? Borisov is a good, experienced actor but it's kind of like a giving an Oscar to a cute puppy in a movie.
That said, his performance had the biggest effect on me (so it obviously works) and I'd pick him in slight edge over Jeremy Strong.
Jeremy Strong's is my favorite performance of the year, lead/supporting, male/female. I knew that as more people actually saw the film, his chances of a nomination would improve. Sure wish Karagulian or Eydelshteyn had been nominated in addition to Borisov (he's fine but third out of three for me). Pearce was also impressive.
I don't care for many of these performances, actually. Norton is just ok, Borisov is surpassed by other supporting players in his film (specially Karagulian) and Culkin is working within the limited range of his own persona. It'll be a bad winner in my book.
Jeremy Strong is the only one who deserved his nomination, in my opinion.
About great lineups in this category, 1999 (law, cruise, osment, duncan, caine) and 1993 (jones, fiennes, dicaprio, malkovich, postlethwait) come to my mind. Comparing those with this year's lineup, I have the sense that dramatic roles are growing scarce.
I think I've commented this here before, but the 1993 lineup is literally one for the ages, with one exception:
TOMMY LEE JONES!
I seriously don't get why he became the favorite that year. I guess career longevity, sort of? Or that his movie was one of the biggest box office hits of the year? There's no nuance or shading to the character at all. Barking quippy orders for 2 hours does not a standout performance make.
The one obvious omission (and who oddly never gained steam over the 1993 season) was Denzel Washington in "Philadelphia," who was very much Hanks' equal. It's truly one of his better turns -- it's subtle, controlled work, and you really feel his shift over the course of the film. And the opera scene works largely (though not exclusively) because you see his gradual realization that the beauty of life is slipping away from his client.
Denzel Washington, "Philadelphia"
Leonardo DiCapiro, "Gilbert Grape"
Ralph Fiennes, "Schindler's List" (my winner, barely)
Pete Postlethwaite, "In the Name of the Father"
John Malkovich, "In the Line of Fire"
Truly any of them could've won and I wouldn't be upset.
Oh, and ditto for 1999 lineup mentioned above -- but AGAIN except for the winner. Caine stunk in "Cider House." Replace with Malkovich in "Being John Malkovich" and 1999 would be the best of the past 50 years.
Also
Borisov -- hottest nominee in years.
Borisov: hottest nominee this year, perhaps. Two of last year's supporting actor nominees made me sweat at least as much as Yura.
I think 4 of the 5 nominees in 2014 were very strong and would have been Oscar-worthy, but of course, the 5th was a real outlier.
I'd have trouble deciding between Borisov and Strong if I were a voter - I'd probably go with Borisov since I love his film, and think Strong's film is just okay. Not that it would matter, as the Academy wants to give Roman Roy an Oscar.
These comments suggest Denzel has entered his Meryl era, so consistently great that people are tired of him getting recognition. Really, he was showing a very different side of himself in Gladiator, and it's tough to think of another actor who would have been as fun in the role.
Paranoid Andrew: Washington is very good in an audience surrogate role but it is most definitely a co-lead. Usually the audience surrogate role is supremely uninteresting ( you don't read The Great Gatsby and think about Nick) but he does quite a lot with it.
A recent "audience surrogate" role is Rita (Zoe Saldana) in Emilia Perez. Can't believe she's going to win the whole thing 😩
Paranoid Android: I shared your feelings about Tommy Lee Jones in The Fugitive, but then I saw it at a 30th anniversary screening a couple years ago and had a lot of affection for his performance. Much more subtle and less quippy that I remembered and I came away thinking it's kinda cool that the Academy awarded solid work in genre film.
I don't think that DiCaprio's nomination has aged very well.