Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Preview and Predictions

Erik Anderson January 17, 2020

The Golden Globes and Critics Choice went lockstep with the same four acting winners in lead and supporting for film and I’m not expecting the Screen Actors Guild to do something outside of coloring within those lines. SAG lined up with Oscars’ acting contenders 4/5 in all categories except lead actor, which only went 3/5.

The really interesting thing about SAG is how long the voting period is. Voters have a full month (December 17-January 17; by comparison Oscar voters have just five days to vote on winners) to vote on winners so you have to imagine that a good portion of the 160,000 members might have voted before Oscar nominations came out. That could give us a Lupita Nyong’o win. I think Zellweger should be able to have this locked down and become only the second woman to win two leading actress SAG awards in its history (Frances McDormand was the first, two years ago).

Renée Zellweger should be able to make history by becoming the first person to earn three individual SAG awards (she previously won in lead for Chicago, but lost the Oscar to Nicole Kidman, and one in supporting for Cold Mountain, which won her the Oscar a year later) and only the second woman to win two lead actress awards after Frances McDormand two years ago.

We could, but it’s a bit of a reach, see Jennifer Lopez topple frontrunner Laura Dern here but it feels like a longshot. The Globes were probably the best place for Lopez to beat Dern so a win here would be one of two things; frontloaded early voting for her (her film would have been seen first) or voters mad at her missing an Oscar nomination. I’m not the person that’s going to make that prediction though. But we have seen SAG nominees win after missing Oscar nominations before; Emily Blunt just last year, for example. With eventual Oscar winner Regina King not nominated, Blunt prevailed over Oscar nominees Emma Stone and Rachel Weisz to win, becoming only the 2nd person ever to win at SAG and not be Oscar-nominated (Beasts of No Nation’s Idris Elba was the first).

What we’re probably looking at is only the third time in SAG’s 26-year history that the motion picture acting winners and cast match up with the Oscars, insofar as most of us are predicting the Oscar winners to be. 2011 and 2015 are the only years that’s happened. But there’s one thing getting in the way of that…

Interestingly, it’s the top SAG award that I’m most curious to how things play out. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood seems like the obvious pick, and it certainly is, but the very existence of Parasite here begs pause. Could it win despite having no individual acting nominations her or at the Oscars? Only one other non-English language film has ever been nominated here (1998’s Life is Beautiful) and that film had a lead acting nominee who won but couldn’t win Cast. Bombshell, despite leading the field here with four, isn’t winning. The Irishman has been a killer for nominations everywhere but equally so it’s been an also-ran for wins. So almost by default, Once should be the winner but really watch out for Parasite. It could spoil big time and if it does, we could be seeing a Best Picture Oscar upset in the making.

Robert De Niro, who received a nomination this year as a member of the cast of The Irishman, is the 2020 recipient of the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award.

The 26th Screen Actors Guild Awards will air live on TNT and TBS January 19, 2020.

MOTION PICTURE

Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture

Bombshell
The Irishman
Jojo Rabbit
PREDICTION: Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Parasite

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role

Christian Bale (Ford v Ferrari)
Leonardo DiCaprio (Once Upon a Time in Hollywood)
Adam Driver (Marriage Story)
Taron Egerton (Rocketman)
PREDICTION: Joaquin Phoenix (Joker)

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role

Cynthia Erivo (Harriet)
Scarlett Johansson (Marriage Story)
Lupita Nyong’o (Us)
Charlize Theron (Bombshell)
PREDICTION: Renée Zellweger (Judy)

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role

Jamie Foxx (Just Mercy)
Tom Hanks (A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood)
Al Pacino (The Irishman)
Joe Pesci (The Irishman)
PREDICTION: Brad Pitt (Once Upon a Time in Hollywood)

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role

PREDICTION: Laura Dern (Marriage Story)
Scarlett Johansson (Jojo Rabbit)
Nicole Kidman (Bombshell)
Jennifer Lopez (Hustlers)
Margot Robbie (Bombshell)

Outstanding Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in a Motion Picture

PREDICTION: Avengers Endgame
Ford v Ferrari
The Irishman
Joker
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

TELEVISION

I feel like television wins will fall in line with the Emmys, Golden Globes and Critics Choice and go in for Fleabag in a big way and Michelle Williams for Female Actor in a Television Movie or Miniseries.

The up in the air categories seem to Male Actor in a Drama Series; I’m going to with Billy Crudup in The Morning Show but almost anyone makes sense. Female Actor in a Drama Series could go Jennifer Aniston (The Morning Show) but SAG loves The Crown so I’m leaning Olivia Colman. I expect, and hope, that Jharrel Jerome adds a SAG award to his Emmy and Critics Choice for Male Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series.

Weirdly, it’s the top category Ensemble in a Drama Series that has me a bit flummoxed. The Morning Show got three individual nominations but missed out on the big one. Conversely, Big Little Lies (now competing in Drama Series) got no individual mentions but landed in Ensemble. Stranger Things has won here before; Game of Thrones and The Handmaid’s Tale never have, on multiple nominations. It feels really open but I’m going to go with Big Little Lies with Stranger Things having a good shot at another.

Note to the Screen Actors Guild: PLEASE add supporting categories to your awards and an ensemble prize for TV Movie and Limited Series.

Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series

PREDICTION: Big Little Lies (HBO)
The Crown (Netflix)
Game of Thrones (HBO)
The Handmaid’s Tale (Hulu)
Stranger Things (Netflix)

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series

Sterling K. Brown (This Is Us)
Steve Carell (The Morning Show)
PREDICTION: Billy Crudup (The Morning Show)
Peter Dinklage (Game of Thrones)
David Harbour (Stranger Things)

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series

Jennifer Aniston (The Morning Show)
Helena Bonham Carter (The Crown)
PREDICTION: Olivia Colman (The Crown)
Jodie Comer (Killing Eve)
Elisabeth Moss (The Handmaid’s Tale)

Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series

Barry (HBO)
PREDICTION: Fleabag (Amazon)
The Kominsky Method (Netflix)
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (Amazon)
Schitt’s Creek (CBC Television)

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series

Alan Arkin (The Kominsky Method)
Michael Douglas (The Kominsky Method)
Bill Hader (Barry)
PREDICTION: Andrew Scott (Fleabag)
Tony Shalhoub (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel)

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series

Christina Applegate (Dead to Me)
Alex Borstein (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel)
Rachel Brosnahan (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel)
Catherine O’Hara (Schitt’s Creek)
PREDICTION: Phoebe Waller-Bridge (Fleabag)

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series

Mahershala Ali (True Detective)
Russell Crowe (The Loudest Voice)
Jared Harris (Chernobyl)
PREDICTION: Jharrel Jerome (When They See Us)
Sam Rockwell (Fosse/Verdon)

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series

Patricia Arquette (The Act)
Toni Collette (Unbelievable)
Joey King (The Act)
Emily Watson (Chernobyl)
PREDICTION: Michelle Williams (Fosse/Verdon)

Outstanding Action Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in a Comedy or Drama Series

Game of Thrones
GLOW
Stranger Things
The Walking Dead
PREDICTION: Watchman

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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.