FINAL Oscar Predictions from the Gold Rush Gang: The Bird vs. The Boy

Three of the four acting races are as locked as acting races can be. Julianne Moore is winning Best Actress for Still Alice, J.K. Simmons is winning Best Supporting Actor for Whiplash and Patricia Arquette is winning Best Supporting Actress for Boyhood. Done. But it’s Best Actor that causing Oscar bloggers to pull their hair out. On paper, and historically, Eddie Redmayne’s turn as Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything is a slam dunk. He’s won the Drama Globe, the SAG, the BAFTA. He’s playing a real-life person. It’s baity as fuck. History and statistics are on his side; the last 10 SAG winners for Performance by a Male Actor in Leading Role have won the Best Actor Oscar. For the last 15+ years, an acting Oscar winner has featured someone playing a real-life person. You’d have to go all the way back to the year Titanic won to find four acting winners all playing fictional characters. Redmayne is the only frontrunner that qualifies. It doesn’t get much better than that. Yet there’s a nagging feeling by some that Michael Keaton, an early frontrunner here back in the fall, can still win. With just a Comedy Globe and BFCA under his belt it’s going to be quite a feat to overcome Redmayne. But with a possible Best Picture win for his film it could be enough for people to check off the veteran actor for the first nomination of a 30+ year career. Right now 9/10 Gold Rush Gang members think Redmayne’s got this with just Richard (again) holding out for a Keaton victory. But, if there was ever a year for an upset, it’s this one.