‘Mank’ Wins Oscar For Best Production Design; Set Decorator Jan Pascale Thanks Career Mentors In Acceptance Speech

Matt Grobar
·2 min read

Production designer Donald Graham Burt and set decorator Jan Pascale took home statuettes for their work on Mank, at the Academy Awards on Sunday.

The Oscar win was Burt’s second, following his triumph in 2008 with David Fincher’s The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. A first-time winner, set decorator Pascale was previously nominated in 2006, for her work on George Clooney’s Good Night, and Good Luck.

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While Burt didn’t give a speech, Pascale paid thanks to director David Fincher, producer Ceán Chaffin, and Burt “for trusting me with this amazing project.”

“It was such an honor to work with such an amazing group of people. Thank you to my crew, who worked their tails off on this just to make it right,” she said. “When I was young, I never realized that this was a career that was even a possibility. There were so many people who helped me along the way, and guided me, and I’m so grateful to all of them, and especially to my wife, Louise, who inspires me everyday.”

The pair had been top contenders to win the Production Design Oscar throughout the 2021 awards season, having already won the the Art Directors Guild Award for Excellence in Production Design, two prizes at the inaugural Set Decorators Society of America Awards (Best Picture, Best Achievement in Decor/Design of a Period Feature Film), a BAFTA Award and a Critics’ Choice Award, among other accolades.

At the Oscars, the pair bested the teams behind August Wilson adaptation Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (production designer: Mark Ricker, set decorators: Karen O’Hara and Diana Stoughton), Florian Zeller’s acclaimed debut feature, The Father (production designer: Peter Francis, set decorator: Cathy Featherstone), Paul Greengrass Western News of the World (production designer: David Crank, set decorator: Elizabeth Keenan), and Christopher Nolan’s Tenet (production designer: Nathan Crowley, set decorator: Kathy Lucas).

Tonight, Mank was nominated in a total of 10 categories, including Best Picture, Director, Actor, Supporting Actress, Cinematography, Costume Design, Makeup and Hairstyling, Sound and Original Score. The pic’s DoP, Erik Messerschmidt, also won, in the category of Best Cinematography.

Directed by David Fincher, the black-and-white period drama follows alcoholic screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz (Gary Oldman), as he endeavors to finish the screenplay for Citizen Kane. Along the way, it also examines the washed-up wordsmith’s relationships with icons of his time, including Marion Davies (Amanda Seyfried), William Randolph Hearst (Charles Dance), and Orson Welles (Tom Burke). Following a limited theatrical release on November 13, 2020, the film began streaming on Netflix on December 4.

Check out Pascale’s acceptance speech above. Her appearance backstage with Burt can be viewed below.

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