This Year’s Biggest Surprise Oscar Nomination Is a Delight, Even if It Is Silly

When it came to this year’s Oscar nominations, which were announced live on Tuesday morning, there were all the usual snubs that ignited X/Twitter, as well as a few unforeseen curveballs. But there’s one nomination that caused a bit more surprise than usual: America Ferrera’s Best Supporting Actress nomination for her role as Gloria, a mother in existential crisis, in the blockbuster film of the year, Barbie. It wasn’t just my work Slack or my movie-themed group chats that expressed faint shock at the decision—even the awards-odds tracker Gold Derby slotted in Ferrera as the ninth choice for a category of five nominees. Indeed, if precursory nominations along the awards circuit are any indication of Oscars chances, Ferrera only had one: a Critics’ Choice nomination. But now, here we are, living in a world where America Ferrera is, in theory, one step closer to winning an Academy Award.

Why is it that few in the industry expected Ferrera to walk away with a nomination for her large part in the biggest movie of 2023? Well, for one, because the academy isn’t usually known to recognize comedic actors. Ferrera, while having worked in Hollywood for decades at this point, is best known for her starring roles in the beloved sitcoms Ugly Betty and Superstore. She shines in the campy, popular types of farce that often go overlooked by the various awards bodies, though she did win an Emmy in 2007 for her work in Ugly Betty. She has plenty of other credits to her name—including lead roles in Real Women Have Curves, Gotta Kick It Up, and Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants—but her history as not just a capable comedic performer, but as a key figure in Hollywood’s scant representation of nonwhite, nonthin bodies on screen has unfortunately led to her being typecast, something that she only started breaking out of in more recent years.

Ferrera was good in Barbie, but many onlookers might agree that she wasn’t quite Oscars good. The shining performances in the film belong to Ryan Gosling, who was nominated for Best Supporting Actor, and Margot Robbie, who was, shockingly, not among the Best Actress nominees. However, Ferrera did the best with what she was given—and what she was given was the exact kind of material that the academy eats up every year. I’m talking about her now-famous two-minute monologue about how “it is literally impossible to be a woman.” Even if you haven’t seen Barbie, you have probably heard the audio clip circulating on TikTok, or seen the lines quoted in countless Instagram captions, or maybe even witnessed someone reciting the monologue in person. The speech, about the double standards of living as a woman in today’s patriarchal society, is supposed to be the watershed moment of Greta Gerwig’s Barbie, a fusion of popular IP and pink-hued feminism to appeal to a mass audience. But by now, after Barbie-mania has died down, more and more viewers have pointed to how the monologue isn’t particularly well written or insightful. It isn’t even the best Gerwig monologue about the double standards of living as a woman in a patriarchal society. (Justice for Little Women!)

But Gloria’s monologue—and, by extension, Ferrera’s standout moment in Barbie—is just empowering and Feminism 101 enough, even if lacking in sharper rhetoric and political coherence, to appeal to the fellow actors who would’ve decided on the nominations. It’s silly, but we already know that the academy is often swayed by the films that grapple with the hot-button topics of our time, only in the least offensive ways. This is how movies like Green Book win Best Picture, leaving viewers at home scratching their heads.

Not for nothing, though, Ferrera tried to make it momentous. And even if it didn’t completely work, I’m absolutely delighted for her. Sure, it would have been nice to see any of the better (in my opinion) 2023 performances, like Julianne Moore in May December, nab a nomination.* But this celebration of a middling performance is actually one of the most refreshing choices the academy has made in a while. I consider it more of a career award, one Ferrera certainly deserves. No matter your feelings about Ferrera—and, I guess, no matter your feelings about the lackluster character of Gloria in Barbie—Ferrera deserves recognition for her 20-plus years of portraying strong, nuanced, funny female characters from big screen to small. America, I salute you!