“Poor Things” beats Bradley Cooper's controversial “Maestro” nose to win Best Makeup at Oscars

Cooper received backlash on social media for wearing a prosthetic to play Leonard Bernstein — though Bernstein's family passionately defended him.

The aestheticians team behind Emma Stone and Willem Dafoe's transformative Poor Things performances pulled off a shocking upset to win Best Makeup and Hairstyling at the 2024 Oscars.

Artists Nadia Stacey, Mark Coulier, and Josh Weston won the award at Sunday night's ceremony over those who made-up Bradley Cooper into famed conductor Leonard Bernstein in Maestro — which was heavily predicted to win the category, despite Cooper's film courting brief online controversy surrounding the actor's use of a prosthetic nose to play the Jewish artist.

Cooper's team — including Kay Georgiou, Lori McCoy-Bell, and Academy Award-winning Bombshell and Darkest Hour special effects makeup artist Kazu Hiro — competed for the honor against the Poor Things crew months after some social media users labeled the 49-year-old actor's facial transformation as "horribly antisemitic" over Cooper's use of a false nose.

Other category contenders included craftspeople behind Golda, Oppenheimer, and Society of the Snow.

Though select viewers pushed back on Cooper's transformation, Bernstein's children, Jamie, Alexander, and Nina Bernstein, released a joint statement in August 2023 praising the filmmaker's vision and commitment to playing their father.

"We were touched to the core to witness the depth of his commitment, his loving embrace of our father's music, and the sheer open-hearted joy he brought to his exploration," the statement read, going on to praise the "profound respect" with which they said Cooper approached the film's story. "It breaks our hearts to see any misrepresentations or misunderstandings of his efforts. It happens to be true that Leonard Bernstein had a nice, big nose. Bradley chose to use makeup to amplify his resemblance, and we're perfectly fine with that. We're also certain that our dad would have been fine with it as well. Any strident complaints around this issue strike us above all as disingenuous attempts to bring a successful person down a notch — a practice we observed all too often perpetrated on our own father."

At the film's Venice Film Festival premiere last year, Hiro also spoke on the controversy.

"I wasn't expecting that to happen," he told the press corp, per Deadline. "I feel sorry that I hurt some people's feelings."

Cooper's film — which distributor Netflix did not bill as a full-on biopic — follows a specific period in Bernstein's life, charting his tumultuous relationship with both his own sexuality as well as with his wife, Felicia Montealegre (Carey Mulligan).

The film scored seven overall Oscar nominations, including for Best Picture, Cooper's script, and the lead performances of both Cooper and Mulligan.

See the full list of 2024 Oscars winners.

Check out more from EW's The Awardist, featuring exclusive interviews, analysis, and our podcast diving into all the highlights from the year's best in TV.

Related content:

• Robert Downey Jr. says 'keep going' after Jimmy Kimmel's Oscars joke about past drug use

• Messi, the handsome Anatomy of a Fall dog, has his own seat at the Oscars

• See where 20 Academy Award winners keep their Oscars

• Where to stream all the 2024 Oscar nominees for Best Picture

• Meghan McCain slams Bradley Cooper's Maestro in Oscars tirade: 'Who are these movies for?'

Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly.