Despite leading the field this year with ten nominations, David Fincher’s Mank is likely walking away with only one award. Hey, at least it’s a better result than The Irishman managed last year. For most of awards season, it’s been all but a certainty the film would win Best Production Design. Mank has taken this award at the BAFTAs and the Critics Choice Awards plus it scooped up wins from the Art Directors Guild, the Set Decorators Association, and close to 20 awards from the critics groups. Of all the locks this year, this one feels the most certain.
The only factor that gives awards watchers pause is the fact it’s extremely rare this category is a film’s solo victory. The last film to win Best Production Design and nothing else was Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street way back in 2007. Before that, it was Sleepy Hollow in 1999. The Academy clearly loves Tim Burton’s production designers. We know rules and statistics means nothing to Oscar voters, but it is a curious piece of history that a Mank victory would break.
Is there really anything that could end Mank‘s sweep this season? Six-time nominee Nathan Crowley is starting to feel overdue for a victory, but Tenet is far from a beloved film this year. There’s a lot of love out there for Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom and it’s highly likely it will be taking home Costume Design and Makeup & Hairstyling, so voters could easily vote for it here as well. But you’d have to assume Academy members will want to give Mank something this year and this has been the chosen category all season long.
BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN FINAL PREDICTION:
1. Mank (Netflix)
Donald Graham Burt (production designer), Jan Pascale (set decorator)
2. Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (Netflix)
Mark Ricker (production designer), Karen O’Hara and Diana Stoughton (set decorators)
3. The Father (Sony Pictures Classics)
Peter Francis (production designer), Cathy Featherstone (set decorator)
4. Tenet (Warner Bros.)
Nathan Crowley (production designer), Kathy Lucas (set decorator)
5. News of the World (Universal Pictures)
David Crank (production designer), Elizabeth Keenan (set decorator)
Will win: Mank
Should win: Mank
Possible shocker: The Father