In January, Jane Campion continued to flex her dominance over the Best Adapted Screenplay race. She picked up another swag of wins from the critics groups plus key nominations from BAFTA and USC Scripter (she was ineligible for WGA). There’s probably nothing stopping Campion’s victory in March, but, for now, an Oscar nomination is as close to a certainty as it comes.
Maggie Gyllenhaal (The Lost Daughter) and Sian Heder (CODA) also both picked up nominations at BAFTA. The former scored a nod from USC Scripter and the latter nabbed a nod from the WGA (like Campion, Gyllenhaal was also ineligible), so they both feel like they’re securely in the final five Oscar nominees.
Ryusuke Hamaguchi and Takamasa Oe have continued to pick up speed in January for Drive My Car. They scored a handful of screenplay wins from the critics groups (including a key win with the National Society of Film Critics), but what seems to have sealed their Oscar nomination is picking up a slightly unexpected nod from BAFTA. Look, there’s every likelihood we awards pundits are overestimating the chances of Drive My Car outside the Best International Feature Film race, but that BAFTA nomination is hard to ignore.
That leaves the fifth spot open to interpretation. For the longest time, I thought Tony Kushner was a shoo-in for an Oscar nod for West Side Story. But the wheels of the film’s Oscar campaign have definitely fallen off and it’s starting to look like less of a technical contender than previously presumed. Kushner scored a nod from the WGA, but that’s likely due to the fact his main rivals were ineligible. He missed with BAFTA and USC Scripter, and I think those were the final nails in the coffin.
Jon Spaihts, Denis Villeneuve, Eric Roth have barely missed a beat this season for Dune with nods from BAFTA, WGA, Critics Choice, and USC Scripter. That kind of run is hard to ignore, so I think they’re in. There’s often a screenplay nomination each year that’s the film’s only representation at the Oscars, but I think that’s more plausible to occur in the original race than adapted.
BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY PREDICTIONS:
1. The Power of the Dog (Netflix)
Jane Campion
2. The Lost Daughter (Netflix)
Maggie Gyllenhaal
3. CODA (Apple TV+)
Sian Heder
4. Drive My Car (Janus Films)
Ryusuke Hamaguchi, Takamasa Oe
5. Dune (Warner Bros.)
Jon Spaihts, Denis Villeneuve, Eric Roth
IN CONTENTION
Cyrano (MGM)
Erica Schmidt
House of Gucci (MGM)
Becky Johnston, Roberto Bentivegna
The Humans (A24)
Stephen Karam
Nightmare Alley (Searchlight Pictures)
Kim Morgan, Guillermo del Toro
Passing (Netflix)
Rebecca Hall
Shiva Baby (Utopia)
Emma Seligman
The Tender Bar (Amazon Studios)
William Monahan
tick, tick… BOOM! (Netflix)
Steven Levenson
The Tragedy of Macbeth (A24/Apple TV+)
Joel Coen
West Side Story (20th Century Studios)
Tony Kushner