FINAL 2019 Oscar Predictions: SUPPORTING ACTRESS

One of the most difficult categories to predict with a top two that are nearly equal in terms of likelihood.

Regina King (If Beale Street Could Talk) has the Golden Globe and the Critics’ Choice but missed out on the two industry nominations from SAG and BAFTA. Rachel Weisz hit all and won BAFTA. SAG went to a non-Oscar nominee (Emily Blunt in A Quiet Place), which really threw a wrench in things. While many make comparisons to Sylvester Stallone in Creed (same wins, same snubs), he was the sole nominee for his film and if you’re going to compare reputations in Hollywood, King comes out shining whereas Stallone’s is problematic and confrontational. There is a huge amount of goodwill towards King, a three-time Emmy winner and industry vet of over 30 years who decimated the competition for critics’ win with over two dozen critics’ awards.

Rachel Weisz (The Favourite) is a previous Oscar winner in this category (2005’s The Constant Gardener) and this is her first nomination since that win. Her film is the nomination co-leader with 10, including two other acting noms and Best Picture. One of those is directly competing against her, Emma Stone, also a previous (and recent) Oscar winner. If you subscribe to vote-splitting as a theory (I don’t, not between two different actors) then you can point to that as a weak spot for Weisz. If you subscribe to the comparison mentioned above, then Weisz is the Mark Rylance (Bridge of Spies) default option this year. Coincidentally, that year also saw the SAG winner (Idris Elba, Beasts of No Nation) not earn an Oscar nomination.

If, and it’s a big if, there is a winner outside of these two it’s going to come from Marina de Tavira in Roma. de Tavira pulled off an historic nomination here, something no one has ever done since SAG, Critics’ Choice, BAFTA and the Golden Globes have all co-existed and that’s earned no nominations from any of them, nor any critics’ wins or nominations, and get that Oscar nod. That is a deep passion vote that puts her, in my estimation, ahead of Stone and 6-time Oscar nominee Amy Adams (Vice). In a year this crazy, this atypical, almost anything could happen.

It’s going to be a nailbiter right until the envelope is opened.