37th USC Scripter Award Nominations: ‘Nickel Boys,’ ‘The Wild Robot,’ ‘Baby Reindeer’ ‘Ripley’

The USC Libraries have revealed the finalists for the 37th-annual Scripter Awards, which nominates both the writers of film and television adaptations and the authors of the original works.

For feature film, adapted screenplay Oscar contenders A Complete Unknown, Conclave, Nickel Boys, Sing Sing and The Wild Robot were nominated. The nomination for The Wild Robot marks only the second animated movie in USC Scripter history to be nominated after Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio, which won the Academy Award. for Animated Feature but was not nominated for Adapted Screenplay.

Several films were ineligible at USC, including and non-English language films (like Emilia Pérez or I’m Still Here) and remakes and sequels to original movies also cannot be nominated here.

The USC Scripter remains strong bellwether for the Oscars’ adapted screenplay category, previous Scripter winners that have matched the Academy in the last decade include The Imitation Game (2014), The Big Short (2015), Moonlight (2016), Call Me by Your Name (2017), Nomadland (2020), Women Talking (2022) and American Fiction (2023). Spike Lee’s BlacKkKlansman (2018) is the only Scripter-eligible film to win the Academy Award without being nominated by the org. That year, Leave No Trace won but did not get nominated at the Oscars.

This year, the selection committee, chaired by USC professor and Academy Vice President Howard Rodman, reviewed 42 films and 66 episodic series adaptations to determine the nominees. Winners will be reavealed on Saturday, February 22, 2025, at the University of Southern California’s Town & Gown ballroom.

Among the film finalists, noteworthy Oscar hopefuls are among the nominees, each based on acclaimed literary works:

• James Mangold and Jay Cocks for A Complete Unknown, adapted from Elijah Wald’s nonfiction book “Dylan Goes Electric! Newport, Seeger, Dylan, and the Night That Split the Sixties”
• Peter Straughan for Conclave, based on the novel by Robert Harris
• RaMell Ross and Joslyn Barnes for Nickel Boys, an adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel “The Nickel Boys”
• Clint Bentley and Greg Kwedar (screenplay and story) and Clarence Maclin and John “Divine G” Whitfield (story) for Sing Sing, drawn from John H. Richardson’s Esquire article “The Sing Sing Follies”
• Chris Sanders and Peter Brown for The Wild Robot, based on Peter Brown’s beloved children’s book of the same name

For television, Emmy winners Baby Reindeer and Shōgun are nominated alongside Ripley, Say Nothing and Slow Horses.

• Richard Gadd for the sixth episode of Baby Reindeer, adapted from his stage play
• Steven Zaillian for the fifth episode of Ripley, based on Patricia Highsmith’s “The Talented Mr. Ripley”
• Joshua Zetumer for “The People in the Dirt” from Say Nothing, inspired by Patrick Radden Keefe’s nonfiction book “Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland”
• Rachel Kondo and Justin Marks for “Anjin,” the premiere episode of Shōgun, based on James Clavell’s novel.
• Will Smith for “Hello Goodbye” from Slow Horses, adapted from Mick Herron’s novel “Spook Street”