2022 Oscar Predictions: SUPPORTING ACTOR (August)

Since last month’s chart (a mere two weeks+ ago) we have festival lineups and a sneak peek at Netflix’s highly anticipated Adam McKay dark comedy Don’t Look Up. A star-studded event, the supporting actor highlight came from two-time Oscar nominee Jonah Hill, playing aide and son to Meryl Streep’s POTUS.

In just 30 seconds, only Hill and star Jennifer Lawrence have onscreen dialogue, with Hill more than Lawrence. Is that anything to go on? Not really, of course, but it did showcase the likely tone of the film and more so, a possible return for Hill to a nomination. He earned his first opposite Brad Pitt in 2011’s Moneyball (a Best Picture nominee) then two years later in The Wolf of Wall Street opposite Leonardo DiCaprio, his main co-star in Don’t Look Up. The Wolf of Wall Street, a late December release, was also nominated for Best Picture and Hill managed to score his nod here with absolutely zero precursors. Can he do it again and will he need Don’t Look Up to hit Best Picture to follow this pattern? He’ll probably face tough competition, in a way he didn’t the first two times, from his ensemble of co-stars, specifically Rob Morgan and Oscar winner Mark Rylance. Morgan is the only other actor featured ever so briefly in that teaser but it’s too early to say how big either of their roles are compared to Hill, even with a pre-shooting script circulating the internet. Is this a Hill I’m ready to die on? Not quite but we’ll see.

Remember how critics tried really hard for that Ben Affleck comeback with The Way Back? Maybe they just needed to wait a bit longer. In the news 24/7 since reuniting with his 90s love Jennifer Lopez, Affleck has been splashed across press and pap pages from his Dunkin’ Donuts iced coffee trips, hearty Amazon delivery pickups and now this invigorated version of himself with JLo. Well, it also turns out that he has a potentially baity role in George Clooney’s newest directorial effort, Tender Bar for Amazon. Just throwing it out there. The streamer, which grabbed multiple Oscar nominations for Sound of Metal and One Night in Miami last season (although only one win), also has the Javier Bardem and Nicole Kidman starrer Being the Ricardos, playing none other than Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball with Oscar winner J.K. Simmons playing William Frawley (Fred Mertz from TV’s I Love Lucy).

Here are my ranked Supporting Actor Oscar predictions for August 2021.

Green – moves up ↑ Red – moves down ↓ Blue – new/re-entry ♦ Black – no movement ↔

1. Richard Jenkins – Nightmare Alley (Searchlight Pictures) ↔
2. Jesse Plemons – The Power of the Dog (Netflix) ↔
3. Bradley Cooper – Untitled Paul Thomas Anderson aka Soggy Bottom (MGM/UA) ↔
4. Adam Driver – The Last Duel (20th Century Studios) ↑
5. Corey Hawkins – The Tragedy of Macbeth (A24) ↑
6. Jared Leto – House of Gucci (MGM/UA) ♦
7. Jonah Hill – Don’t Look Up (Netflix) ♦
8. Jason Isaacs – Mass (Bleecker Street) ↑
9. Ciarán Hinds – Belfast (Focus Features) ↑
10. Ben Affleck – Tender Bar (Amazon) ♦

Other contenders: David Alvarez – West Side Story (20th Century Studios), Jon Bernthal – King Richard (Warner Bros/HBO Max), Robin de Jesus – tick, tick…BOOM! (Netflix), Willem Dafoe – Nightmare Alley ↓ (Searchlight Pictures), Benicio Del Toro – The French Dispatch (Searchlight Pictures), Jamie Dornan – Belfast (Focus Features), Brendan Gleeson – The Tragedy of Macbeth (A24), Kelvin Harrison, Jr. – Cyrano (MGM), Richard Jenkins – The Humans (A24), Rob Morgan – Don’t Look Up (Netflix), Troy Kostur – CODA ♦ (Apple), Alessandro Nivola – The Many Saints of Newark (Warner Bros/HBO Max), Al Pacino – House of Gucci ↓ (MGM/UA), Mark Rylance – Don’t Look Up ↓ (Netflix), Benny Safdie – Untitled Paul Thomas Anderson aka Soggy Bottom ♦ (MGM/UA), Kodi Smit-McPhee – The Power of the Dog (Netflix), David Strathairn – Nightmare Alley (Searchlight Pictures), Steven Yeun – The Humans (A24)