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Viola Davis will campaign for Best Supporting Actress!

posted 8 years ago by SibTower1987
6 replies | jump to latest

After months of speculation, Viola Davis will campaign for Best Supporting Actress (not Lead Actress) for Fences!

The reason why is the Best Actress race this upcoming award season is becoming very intense and fierce!
In the running are Natalie Portman (for Jackie), then followed by Emma Stone (for La La Land), Ruth Negga (for Loving), Annette Bening (for 20th Century Women), Amy Adams (for Arrival), Jessica Chastain (for Miss Sloane), Isabelle Huppert (for Elle) and Meryl Streep (for Florence Foster Jenkins).

The front-runner is Natalie Portman (for Jackie)! - She's playing Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and this is the first big screen film that solely focuses on her. Plus, Academy voters love biographical films and favorably award them.

Another reason is that in the play, the character of Rose Maxson is seen more supporting player. Also people who have seen the film say Viola Davis as a co-lead isn't as clear-cut, and that she could easily be seen as supporting Denzel Washington (the film's unequivocal center)! - In the 1987 Broadway production, Mary Alice played Rose and won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play. In 2010 Broadway production, Viola Davis won the Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Play, because the revival's producers successfully lobbied for her to be treated as a lead, a move that paid off!

Paramount Pictures and producer Scott Rudin see this as a chance for Viola Davis to finally win a Oscar!
The strategy is to place her in the Best Supporting Actress category, because she has better odds of winning!
Take current Best Supporting Actress winner Alicia Vikander who won for The Danish Girl. Critics & Experts say that Alicia Vikander was more of a co-lead with Eddie Redmayne. Fearing she wouldn't get nominated or win in Lead Actress, the producers put her in Best Supporting Actress, because she had better odds of winning!

Her competition in the Best Supporting Actress category are Michelle Williams (for Manchester by the Sea), Naomie Harris (for Moonlight) and Lupita Nyong'o (for Queen of Katwe). These three actress have less screen time in their films, than Viola Davis does in Fences!

Also the long-suffering wife role is a Best Supporting Actress mainstay, and actresses like Jennifer Connelly (for A Beautiful Mind), Marcia Gay Harden (for Pollock), Rachel Weisz (for The Constant Gardener) and Alicia Vikander (for The Danish Girl) have all won for exemplifying patience and support within a rocky marriage.

Could the Academy reject the campaign and nominate her as a Lead Actress anyway, because that's what they did to Kate Winslet in 2008 for The Reader! - She campaigned as Best Supporting Actress for won the Golden Globe, SAG & Critic's Choice Award, but was put in Lead Actress and won the BAFTA & Oscar!

[–] Dr_Dmitri-Yuriev 8 years ago

Winslet situation was different she had another role that was vying for lead (Revolutionary Road), clearly AMPAS didn't like that film enough, so they upgraded her for "The Reader" which was far more loved considering its picture nomination.

[–] alyssawatcher 8 years ago

I can't say I'm on board with this decision. I have seen the play and think Viola Davis could have gone lead. I understand lead actress is packed but so is supporting actress. My only guess is they feel she can win. It seems like Emma Stone is the top contender for lead actress with Natalie Portman a close second. As an African American woman I am thrilled to have such choices as Naomie Harris, Lupita's Nyongo, and Ruth Jetta in the mix. If Hidden Figures does indeed do well Taraji P. Henson could join the lead actress contenders too.

[–] heartyburgundy 8 years ago

Supporting is packed, but there's no clear front-runner unlike Best Actress where there are already two (Stone and Portman). Supporting is a more viable and malleable slot because, although Michelle Williams has been getting most of the momentum in this category, everyone else Viola is competing with will have much less screen time and/or doesn't necessarily have a secured spot in the category.

I understand why they are campaigning her for supporting, but I do feel like - in the larger picture - it is a disservice to both her as an actress and the Fences piece as a whole. She won the Tony for leading the same play years ago and is one of the best actresses around right now... I know an Oscar is an Oscar, but it sucks that she has to be relegated to a lesser category based on politics and strategy.

She'll probably win another Oscar in her lifetime, though, so it's fine.

[–] Hugo-James 8 years ago

They do it every year. They did it with Rooney Mara this year. She had more screentime than Cate Blachet, yet she was supporting?
I don't really understand how they get away with it. But if Viola's role is the same as the play, she should 100% be in lead category and unfortunately, she would lose to the frontrunner (Emma Stone) and Michelle Williams would win supporting.

I'm not much on rear-window ethics.

[–] alexanderreid19 8 years ago

This is total crap!!!!!

'SCARING THE LITTLE GIRL?!?'

[–] moviegeek1 8 years ago

Aren't we getting a bit ahead of ourselves here? I mean, the nominations are over two months away. At this point, most of this is just speculation.

Sister, when I've raised hell, you'll know it!