‘Barbie’ or ‘Oppenheimer’ would be 10th film to win both supporting acting Oscars

Among the various distinctions “Everything Everywhere All at Once” incurred by winning seven awards at the 95th Oscars was becoming the first film in a dozen years (and ninth overall) to conquer both supporting acting categories. This rare occurrence involved Ke Huy Quan and Jamie Lee Curtis preventing their respective “The Banshees of Inisherin” competitors from accomplishing the same goal, as the sets of featured nominees from “Belfast” and “The Power of the Dog” had both failed to do one year earlier. Now, two more pairs of cast mates – who happen to hail from the two highest-grossing live action movies of 2023 – are gunning for entry into this exclusive club.

The concurrent nominations of Ryan Gosling and America Ferrera (“Barbie”) and Robert Downey Jr. and Emily Blunt (“Oppenheimer”) bring the total number of films that have ever vied for both Best Supporting Actor and Actress to 110. Although this marks the third consecutive instance of multiple films having shots at both prizes, the latest contenders differ from their two sets of immediate predecessors in that none of them are directly battling their costars. Conversely, “The Power of the Dog” and “The Banshees of Inisherin” both landed dual supporting male bids (Jesse Plemons and Kodi Smit-McPhee; Brendan Gleeson and Barry Keoghan), while Curtis was forced to fend off Quan’s on-screen daughter, Stephanie Hsu.

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Aside from “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” the only other 21st century film that has produced multiple supporting winners is “The Fighter,” for which Christian Bale and Melissa Leo were honored in 2011. The seven pairs of featured victors who preceded them were Karl Malden and Kim Hunter (“A Streetcar Named Desire,” 1952), Frank Sinatra and Donna Reed (“From Here to Eternity,” 1954), Red Buttons and Miyoshi Umeki (“Sayonara,” 1958), George Chakiris and Rita Moreno (“West Side Story,” 1962), Ben Johnson and Cloris Leachman (“The Last Picture Show,” 1972), Jason Robards and Vanessa Redgrave (“Julia,” 1978), and Michael Caine and Dianne Wiest (“Hannah and Her Sisters,” 1987).

Most of the 18 individual winners in this group were not pitted against cast mates of the same gender, but a few did precede Curtis in that respect. This includes Leo, who won against Amy Adams, as well as Johnson, Leachman, and Robards, who respectively defeated Jeff Bridges, Ellen Burstyn, and Maximilian Schell.

Including the six 2020s examples, a total of 14 films have competed for both supporting Oscars within the last decade. The only two of the other eight that ended up winning even one of the awards were “Boyhood” (2015; Patricia Arquette) and “Moonlight” (2017; Mahershala Ali), while the totally unsuccessful ones were “Birdman” (2015), “Spotlight” (2016), “Lion” (2017), “Manchester by the Sea” (2017), “The Shape of Water” (2018), and “Vice” (2019).

According to Gold Derby’s racetrack odds, “Oppenheimer” has a much better chance than “Barbie” of becoming the next film to win both of these awards, primarily due to critics and industry favorite Downey’s status as his category’s obvious frontrunner. Unfortunately, his female equivalent is not Blunt but rather Da’Vine Joy Randolph of “The Holdovers,” whose share of top choice votes is even greater than his. At this point, there is very little likelihood of either presumed victor faltering, but, since “Oppenheimer” is already favored to rake in eight awards (including Best Picture), it’s perfectly feasible that one more could be added to the mix.

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