2018 Oscar Predictions: BEST ACTOR (June) – Timothée Chalamet Hits the top 5; Cannes winner Joaquin Phoenix Debuts

Erik Anderson June 6, 2017

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Unsurprisingly, Gary Oldman (Darkest Hour) remains atop the list with a perfect score of 100, just as he did last month, something I don’t expect to change for a long time, if ever. Daniel Day-Lewis is still strong at #2 for Paul Thomas Anderson’s fashion project which now has a name – Phantom Thread. Tom Hanks holds on at #3 for Steven Spielberg’s Pentagon Papers Project, which is at #1 in Best Picture and Best Director this month.

Andrew Garfield (Breathe) moves up one to #4 where he is tied with 21-year old Timothée Chalamet (Call My By Your Name). This is Chalamet’s highest ranking so far this year and it boots two-time Oscar winner Denzel Washington (Inner City) out of the top 5. As you’ll see from Washington’s line, he only has votes from 6 out of 10 Gold Rush Gang members as some of us are holding back on votes until confirmation comes down that his film is coming out in 2017. Looking at this year’s crop of likely Best Actor contenders, it would be smart for Sony to make sure it does as there is a shocking lack of diversity in these choices. The only other non-white actor to receive votes again this month is Chadwick Boseman (Marshall) and digging into the Other Contenders list offers very little hope.

We only have one debut this month, newly crowned Cannes Best Actor winner for You Were Never Really Here at #11. Lots of drop-offs though, including Adam Sandler (The Meyerowitz Stories), Matt Damon (Downsizing) and Domhnall Gleeson (Goodbye Christopher Robin). Sandler and Gleeson debuted on the list last month. The only debut from last month to make the cut this month is Charlie Plummer (Lean on Pete).

Here are the 2018 Oscar predictions for Best Actor for June from the Gold Rush Gang. Keep an eye on all of the Gold Rush Gang’s 2018 Oscar predictions updated LIVE throughout the month.

Green – moves up from last month
Red – moves down from last month
Blue – debut/new entry

	BEST ACTOR	ERIK ANDERSON	BRYAN BONAFEDE	GREG HOWARD	EVAN KOST	JASON OSIASON	KENNETH POLISHCHUK	DENIZCAN SÜRÜCÜ	RICHARD ANTHONY	ŞÜKRÜ SÖĞÜT	MATT DINN	TOTAL POINTS

1	Gary Oldman – Darkest Hour	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	100
2	Daniel Day-Lewis – Phantom Thread	2	2	2	2		2	7	3	2	3	74
3	Tom Hanks – Untitled Steven Spielberg Pentagon Papers Project	3	7	5	3	7	3	4	4	3	5	66
4	Andrew Garfield – Breathe	6	5	9	6	5	4	5	7	6	6	51
4	Timothée Chalamet – Call Me by Your Name	5	4	8	4	2	8	6	8	7	7	51

6	Denzel Washington – Inner City (possibly 2018)		3			4		2	2	4	2	49
7	Bryan Cranston – Last Flag Flying		6		7	3	7	3	6	8	4	44
8	Chadwick Boseman – Marshall	4		4	5		5			9	9	30
9	Benedict Cumberbatch – The Current War	10	10	6	10	6	10	8	5	10	10	25
10	Hugh Jackman – The Greatest Showman	9		9	9		9	9	10	5		17
11	Joaquin Phoenix – You Were Never Really Here	8	8		8		6					14
12	Ben Stiller – Brad’s Status					8		10			8	7
13	Donald Sutherland – The Leisure Seeker			7					9			6
13	Jake Gyllenhaal – Stronger	7				9						6
15	Charlie Plummer – Lean on Pete		9			10						3

	OTHER CONTENDERS
	Adam Sandler – The Meyerowitz Stories
	Ali Fazal – Victoria and Abdul
	Andrew Garfield – Under the Silver Lake
	Anthony Mackie – Detroit
	Ben Foster – Galveston
	Benicio Del Toro – Soldado
	Billy Howle – On Chesil Beach
	Bryan Cranston – Untouchable
	Chiwetel Ejiofor – Come Sunday
	Christian Bale – Hostiles
	Clive Owen – Andorra
	Colin Farrell – The Beguiled
	Colin Farrell – The Killing of a Sacred Deer
	Colin Firth – The Mercy
	Daniel Craig – Kings
	Demetrius Shipp, Jr. – All Eyez On Me
	Domhnall Gleeson – Goodbye Christopher Robin
	Fionn Whitehead – Dunkirk
	Idris Elba – The Mountain Between Us
	James McAvoy – Submergence
	Jamie Bell – Film Stars Don’t Die in Liverpool
	Jason Clarke – Chappaquiddick
	Jason Clarke – The Aftermath
	Jason Clarke – The Man with the Iron Heart
	Javier Bardem – Escobar
	Javier Bardem – mother!
	Jean-Louis Trintignant – Happy End
	Joaquin Phoenix – Mary Magdalene
	Jonathan Pryce – The Wife
	Kenneth Branagh – Murder on the Orient Express
	Liam Neeson – The Silent Man
	Matt Damon – Downsizing
	Matt Damon – Suburbicon
	Michael Douglas – Head Full of Honey
	Michael Fassbender – The Snowman
	Michael Shannon – The Current War
	Oscar Isaac – Life Itself
	Ryan Gosling – Blade Runner 2049
	Steve Carell – Battle of the Sexes
	Tom Hardy – Fonzo

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Erik Anderson

Erik Anderson is the founder/owner and Editor-in-Chief of AwardsWatch and has always loved all things Oscar, having watched the Academy Awards since he was in single digits; making lists, rankings and predictions throughout the show. This led him down the path to obsessing about awards. Much later, he found himself in film school and the film forums of GoldDerby, and then migrated over to the former Oscarwatch (now AwardsDaily), before breaking off to create AwardsWatch in 2013.

He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Hollywood Critics Association (HCA) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.