A few days after little-known British actor Andrea Riseborough received an Oscar nomination for her role in low-budget indie flick To Leslie, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced it was reviewing this year’s campaigns.
On January 27, concerns were raised about the grassroots campaign by Hollywood A-listers for Riseborough before Oscar nominations closed.
So, for transparency and to avoid another controversy after last year’s “slap-gate”, the Academy announced it was “conducting a review of the campaign procedures around this year’s nominees, to ensure that no guidelines were violated”.
Riseborough and the film To Leslie were not mentioned.
Big-name stars including Gwyneth Paltrow, Kate Winslet, Jane Fonda, Demi Moore and Jennifer Aniston hosted screenings and took to social media to get Riseborough’s name in the spotlight.
Titanic Oscar winner Winslet went so far as to say: “This is the greatest female performance on screen I have ever seen in my life.”
Some say it was an innocent campaign, an honest strategy to jog along a film with no major financial or strategic input – like Avatar or Top Gun.
To Leslie, a film that made less than $30,000 at the box office and was barely seen outside of the Academy’s digital viewing portal, except for a few film festivals, is about a West Texas single mother (Riseborough) who struggles to provide for her son when she wins the lottery.
“I’m astounded,” Riseborough told Deadline after hearing she had been nominated alongside Cate Blanchett (Tar), Ana de Armas (Blonde), Michelle Williams (The Fabelmans) and Michelle Yeoh (Everything Everywhere All at Once).
“It’s such an unexpected ray of light. It was so hard to believe it might ever happen because we really hadn’t been in the running for anything else.
“It felt like the most natural thing in the world to do, to keep talking about it even if people weren’t very interested in it because as soon as they watched the film, they became instantly interested and couldn’t shake off the story,” she said.
Riseborough said the film “drove itself”, as neither she nor the film were flagged at the major awards ceremonies in recent weeks, including the Golden Globes and the Critics Choice Awards.
So how did it happen?
Riseborough says the film community rallied around and made noise.
Variety retraced the publicity campaign, revealing how radio host Howard Stern started talking about To Leslie on his SiriusXM show, before Charlize Theron hosted a screening.
As Riseborough received a Film Independent Spirit Award nomination for best lead actress, the director Michael Morris’ wife, actor Mary McCormack, “got to work”.
“McCormack sent an email to friends asking them to publicly support the movie and Riseborough’s performance, even including images and suggested hashtags and accounts to tag in social media posts.
“‘If you’re willing to post every day between now and Jan 17th [the last day of Oscar nomination voting], that would be amazing!’,” she wrote in one email seen by Variety.
“But anything is helpful, so please do whatever makes you comfortable.
“And what’s more comfortable than posting about a movie every day!”
To Leslie was shot over 19 days in Los Angeles during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Then the screenings started.
Paltrow hosted a viewing on January 12, taking to Instagram: “Last night we had the true pleasure of watching a masterpiece of a film called To Leslie.
“Andrea should win every award there is and all the ones that haven’t been invented yet.”
Fellow actors joined in the chorus, including Minnie Driver, Jane Fonda, Sally Field, Liam Neeson and Geena Davis.
I don’t post a lot about films or actor performances…maybe I should more often. But for those interested in really great acting I’ll share that Andrea Riseborough’s portrayal in ‘To Leslie’ just knocked me sideways. It’s about the most fully committed, emotionally deep… pic.twitter.com/62fN9FiNfc
— Edward Norton 🌻🇺🇦 (@EdwardNorton) January 10, 2023
And Blanchett, who won a Critics Choice best actress award for Tar, praised Riseborough.
Deadline described the January 24 nomination announcement as a “miracle”.
Who gets left off the list?
UK-born Riseborough, 41, has appeared in dozens of TV series and films since her career began in 2005 including Waco, Birdman, The Grudge reboot and Mandy.
Of late, she’s had a few bigger roles in Amsterdam and in Netflix’s Matilda the Musical.
But some say her performance as a messed-up alcoholic mother in To Leslie isn’t enough to have snubbed Viola Davis (The Woman King), Golden-Globe nominated Olivia Colman (Empire of Light) and Danielle Deadwyler for Till.
Could the Academy rescind the nomination?
The AMPAS statement said it was its “goal to ensure that the Awards competition is conducted in a fair and ethical manner, and we are committed to ensuring an inclusive awards process”.
“We are conducting a review of the campaign procedures around this year’s nominees, to ensure that no guidelines were violated, and to inform us whether changes to the guidelines may be needed in a new era of social media and digital communication,” it read.
“We have confidence in the integrity of our nomination and voting procedures, and support genuine grassroots campaigns for outstanding performances.”
Her co-star Marc Maron says he’s reckons “nothing is going to happen because of [an investigation]”, saying that he fully expects Riseborough to keep her nomination.
The Academy is set to meet on January 31 (February 1 AEDT) to discuss Riseborough, among other topics.
