On Sunday, the Toronto film festival will hand out its prizes and roll up its red carpet, a week after the Venice film festival did the same. This means only one thing: the start of Oscar season.
And, as the dust settles on these prestige launchpads, pundits have started to notice that there’s something remarkably similar about three of the key best actor contenders. They’re British. They’re former pin-ups now hovering around 60. And they’re all awards bridesmaids, so far unfeted by Oscar and long overdue for podium toasting.
Of the three, Ralph Fiennes looks the strongest bet. Now 61, Fiennes has won rave reviews for his performance as a troubled cardinal in classy pulp thriller Conclave, adapted from the Robert Harris bestseller and directed by Edward Berger, whose All Quiet on the Western Front won four Oscars from nine nominations two years ago (and swept the board at the Baftas).
Despite his status as one of the most acclaimed actors of the age, Fiennes hasn’t been on an Oscar shortlist for almost three decades. His nomination in breakout film Schindler’s List was unsuccessful, in part because of his youth, in part because the Academy is squeamish about appearing to actively celebrate Nazis. Then, in 1997, he lost out on the lead actor gong to Shine’s Geoffrey Rush (though The English Patient, in which Fiennes starred, did bag nine other Oscars).
“Fiennes has the perception of being overdue,” says Jenelle Riley, deputy awards and features editor at Variety. She believes he was particularly egregiously ignored for his mad chef turn in 2022’s The Menu; similar outrage met snubs for roles in The End of the Affair, The Constant Gardener, Coriolanus, A Bigger Splash and, especially, The Grand Budapest Hotel.
Awards expert Guy Lodge agrees. “Fiennes has the kind of IOU from the Academy that often translates into an overdue Oscar when the right vehicle comes along,” he says, “and the chewy, accessible dramatics of Conclave fit the bill.”
Yet worthiness doesn’t always equal a win; in 2019 Olivia Colman, then 45, pipped 72-year-old much-loved veteran Glenn Close in the final furlong of the best actress race. There’s also the concern Fiennes’s careful, subtle work in Conclave, as a man wrangling his own crisis of faith and assorted candidates for the next pope, may not feature the kind of show reel emoting awards ceremonies rely on.
The same can’t be said for the turn of Daniel Craig in Queer, Luca Guadagnino’s sweat-drenched adaptation of the William Burroughs novel. Craig plays the writer’s alter ego: a drunk, horny, drug-ravaged expat writer living in Mexico who begins an affair with a young American soldier.
“It’s a beautifully vulnerable performance,” says Riley, “and his longing and frustration are palpable and the kind of risk the Academy loves to reward.” It’s the latest highly successful pivot from Craig, 56, since he shed James Bond’s tux – though it might also be perceived by some as too radical a swerve from the mainstream.
Says Lodge: “While I think many voters would be happy to welcome him back to the serious-thespian fold after years of Bond duty – Sean Connery won best supporting actor for The Untouchables, after all – the wild stylings of Queer will make it a divisive contender, despite his fine work.”
Lodge classifies Craig as a “wild card”; the dark horse is Hugh Grant, 64, in the mix for his gleeful lead in Heretic, an ingenious torturing-Mormons horror. It’s the most devilish turn yet from Grant following a run of roles of escalating nastiness – as a coat-tailing creep in Florence Foster Jenkins, would-be murderer in A Very English Scandal, egomaniac actor/master criminal in Paddington 2 and actual murderer in The Undoing.
“Grant has come close before at the Oscars,” says Riley, who calls his work on Paddington 2 “criminally overlooked”. “And while Oscar doesn’t always reward the horror genre,” she continues, “there are always notable exceptions, from Kathy Bates in Misery to Natalie Portman in Black Swan.”
Heretic comes courtesy of hip distributor A24, the US outfit whose previous films in that country include Oscar favourites such as Everywhere Everything All at Once and Moonlight and indie hits Midsommar, Civil War and Uncut Gems.
However, this year the brand may be suffering from something of a surfeit of actors to campaign for. Nicole Kidman won the best actress award at Venice last week for erotic drama Babygirl; it also has the US rights to Queer, as well as to Sing Sing, the prison drama led by Colman Domingo, who many are tipping as a frontrunner. Might Grant be edged out of the running if A24 choose to put their eggs in the most obvious baskets?
Riley thinks all three Brits remain strong contenders. Their career arcs are not so dissimilar as “journeyman performers who likely got typecast due to their stardom, but are actually wonderful character actors at heart”. And all three are known as charmers on the awards circuit – despite Grant demonstrating a certain red carpet allergy in recent years that has alienated some Americans.
“Personally, I don’t see Hugh as cranky at all,” says Riley. “I think he’s kind of curmudgeonly in the same fun way as Harrison Ford. People who actually work with him seem to like him.”
And should Grant have the opportunity to make one acceptance speech on the circuit, more victories will likely follow. His speech 29 years ago for his most recent significant win – the 1995 Golden Globe for Four Weddings and a Funeral – is still fondly remembered, both for its wit and positive reinforcement. “I know you’re meant to think awards are invidious,” he said, “but I think they’re heaven and this is right up my alley.”
Aside from Domingo – who was a personable presence on the circuit this spring for Rustin – the three Brits’ chief competition is Adrien Brody as an architect in epic postwar drama The Brutalist, as well as two younger stars whose films are yet to be seen.
Much will depend on how convincing a Bob Dylan Timothée Chalamet makes in A Complete Unknown, whose move forward to a 2024 release date suggests considerable confidence by its distributors. The film is directed by James Mangold, whose 2005 biopic of Johnny Cash, Walk the Line, won multiple awards including Golden Globes for stars Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon, as well as an Oscar for the latter, for her portrayal of June Carter Cash.
Hollywood already feels well-disposed towards Chalamet, 28, following the much-needed box office lift given by Dune: Part Two back in February. In 2018 the Academy made him the youngest best-actor nominee since 1939 for his role in Call Me By Your Name; this year they will be yet more conscious of the gen Z credibility boost celebrating him would confer.
Yet this could also be offered by Paul Mescal, 28, who was nominated two years ago for Aftersun. Mescal will doubtless be hoping Gladiator II does for him what Riley Scott’s first film did for Russell Crowe, who won an Oscar for his roaring toga and sandals turn at the turn of the century.
And if it doesn’t? There’s always next year, with Chloé Zhao’s Hamnet, in which Mescal plays Shakespeare, and The History of Sound, a first world war romance opposite Josh O’Connor. Let’s just hope he doesn’t have as long to wait as Fiennes, Craig or Grant.
• This article was amended on 16 September 2024 because the director of the Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown is James Mangold, not Taylor Hackford as an earlier version said.
