Oscars scorecard: ‘Oppenheimer’ extends lead after SAG wins
“Oppenheimer” isn’t just ambling its way to an Oscar Best Picture win, it’s marching with purpose, destroying opponents at every awards ceremony. That continued to be the case on Saturday, February 24, in what was a thoroughly enjoyable SAG Awards ceremony. This was the latest installment in this year’s 35 boxes theory, which aims to calculate a film’s chances of winning the Oscar for Best Picture by judging their popularity across the industry throughout awards season.
Each box represents a key nomination or win at various awards groups (SAG, BAFTA, DGA, PGA, the Globes etc) that a film typically needs to snag in order to compete for or win Best Picture at the Academy Awards. The more boxes you tick off, the greater your support across the industry, the higher your chances of winning Best Picture — that’s the idea, anyway.
For example, in 2019, “Green Book” won 23 of these 35 boxes before winning Best Picture at the Oscars. Conversely, “Roma” filled in only 19 boxes while both “BlacKkKlansman” and “The Favourite” were at 20. Each of the three previous Best Picture winners prior to “Green Book” numbered among the top three entries on our season-end charts.
The last round saw several movies tick off the box for WGA Nomination. This time around, it’s the actors’ guild’s turn with two boxes available — SAG Solo Win and SAG Ensemble Win. Here’s what happened in terms of the boxes.
As you can see, “Oppenheimer” performed well yet again, winning three awards in total. The Universal movie won Best Ensemble — the SAG’s equivalent to Best Picture — while it also won Best Actor for Cillian Murphy and Best Supporting Actor for Robert Downey Jr. You don’t get multiple ticks for multiple solo wins, however, so both individual wins go down as one box ticked — SAG Solo Win. That means that “Oppenheimer” now sits on an awe-inspiring 30 out of 35 boxes ticked. So far, Christopher Nolan‘s film has only missed two boxes — Golden Globes Writing Win and BAFTA Writing Win. Incredible.
Only two other films ticked off SAG Solo Win, then, and they were “The Holdovers” and “Killers of the Flower Moon.” “The Holdovers” predictably won Best Supporting Actress for Da’Vine Joy Randolph, so that film is on 19 boxes ticked. Conversely, Lily Gladstone shocked to a Best Actress win for “Killers of the Flower Moon,” landing that film on 19 boxes ticked, too. Meanwhile, Emma Stone lost, meaning “Poor Things” faltered and remains on 20 boxes ticked. The gap between first and second place is now the biggest it has ever been.
Next up are the PGA Awards on February 25, where “Oppenheimer” could tick off its 31st box of the season. After that, it’s only the ACE Eddie Awards left. They’ll take place on March 3 and then it’s Oscars night on March 10. And it’s getting harder and harder to see anything but an “Oppenheimer” sweep.
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