When It Comes to the 2026 Oscars, Whose Time Is It Anyway?

Nate Jones is back from leave and will be officially taking back the reins of Gold Rush on December 5. This week, he and Movies Fantasy League commissioner Joe Reid are splitting duties — Joe is capping off his three-month stint as this newsletter’s host by leading a conversation about this year’s moment-having Oscar contenders, and Nate is launching his season’s “Oscar Futures.”

If you’ve been around the Oscars conversation long enough, a few oft-repeated phrases and clichés get lodged into your brain. You become an expert in concepts like “category fraud” and “lone director” and how many nominations Diane Warren has accumulated (16). One superlative Oscars nerds especially like to play around with is “It’s their time” or “It’s their year.” Christopher Nolan winning for Oppenheimer? It was his time. Michelle Yeoh and Jamie Lee Curtis winning for Everything Everywhere All at Once? Finally, it was their time! The phrase sounds like self-fulfilling prophecy, or at least so vibes-based that you can’t really assign meaning to it. But we would argue that you can. And in fact, it applies to several people currently in the mix for this year’s Oscars.

Joe Reid: Nate, I’d begin by saying that “It’s their year” isn’t something that can apply to just anyone in the Oscar race. Renate Reinsve is very much in the Best Actress Oscar race for Sentimental Value, but I’m not sure anyone can make the argument that this feels like her time. Sean Penn is on most people’s short lists of Supporting Actor contenders for One Battle After Another, but I wouldn’t say this is his year. “It’s their time” is more encompassing. It’s when everything seems to be coming together for an actor or filmmaker: They’re in a widely appreciated movie showcasing good work, popular opinion on them is cresting, and an Oscar win would feel both presently earned and reflective of where they are in their career. Would you say that’s about right?

Nate Jones: Hi, Joe! First off, thanks for handling Gold Rush while I dealt with some roommate drama. (This new person is emotionally volatile, keeps a very odd diet, and hasn’t yet paid for her share of the rent or utilities.) When it comes to the sense of it being someone’s time, you’ve pinpointed a fascinating phenomenon. I’d add that “It’s their year” is actually two separate but related narratives. The first type is the one we saw for Will Smith with King Richard, Viola Davis with Fences, and Leonardo DiCaprio with The Revenant — an esteemed industry figure who hasn’t yet gotten their due from the Academy receives an entire career’s worth of hosannas all at once. (What separates this from a “career win” like Curtis’s is the sense that this project is genuinely considered one of the artistic high points on their résumé.) The second type is the one we saw for Jennifer Lawrence in Silver Linings Playbook — a performance that’s so undeniable that it doesn’t really matter what you’ve done before. You’ve made a leap, and everyone else just has to get out of your way.

This season brings one standout example of an “It’s their time” campaign. Paul Thomas Anderson is one of the most acclaimed and influential directors of his generation. He has been nominated for 11 Oscars over the course of his career and lost them all. Now here he comes with One Battle After Another, a film that has not only earned critical raves and the best box office of his career, but seems almost preternaturally plugged into the Zeitgeist of the second Trump era. No other film in the race feels as “2025” as One Battle, which of course only bolsters the argument for this being PTA’s year. By most pundits’ estimations, Best Picture and Best Director are both his to lose.

Apart from PTA, though, are there any other “It’s their year” picks you have your eye on, Joe?

J.R.: I’ll stick with the Best Director category, because you’re right that PTA makes for the best “It’s his time”/“It’s his year” case. But why couldn’t it also be Ryan Coogler’s year? Sinners is a bigger box-office hit than One Battle After Another, and Coogler’s career has been far more broadly consumed than Anderson’s has. With the Black Panther and Creed films backing him up, this feels like the exact right time for Hollywood to hold him up as their standard-bearer. Though I wonder if, because Coogler has never been nominated in Best Director before, a nomination in that category might be seen as sufficient recognition of his year.

Then there’s Josh Safdie, another director looking for his first-ever Oscar nomination. Marty Supreme hasn’t opened yet, but the buzz on the movie has it surpassing brother Benny’s The Smashing Machine. And while the brothers are insistent that there isn’t a competition between them, if there is, Josh is winning. And who doesn’t want to get onboard with a winner? That’s one of the messages of his movie!

I think the best argument against it being Josh Safdie’s year is that it’s actually his lead actor’s year. More than any other actor in contention this year, Timothée Chalamet has the potential to own the year’s best “It’s his time” narrative. At age 29 (he turns 30 in a month), he’s rounding up on his third Best Actor nomination, and if Marty Supreme gets into the Best Picture field it will be his eighth such movie to do so. His performance in Marty Supreme is a feat of chutzpah and kinetic energy that lends itself to terms like “undeniable.” And if the movie is a box-office hit, it’ll be his third December success in as many years (after A Complete Unknown and Wonka). Is there any argument against him being the leading man of the moment?

N.J.: The only counterargument to this being Timmy’s time is the fact that, traditionally, the Academy lags a few years behind the wider culture when it comes to acknowledging young leading men of the moment. Chalamet has had the best come-up of any young actor since DiCaprio, but recall that Leo didn’t win until his sixth acting nomination, when he was in his 40s. It might feel like Timmy’s year to us, but voters may still feel as if he hasn’t quite paid his dues. Especially as it seems like Chalamet is once again running a nontraditional campaign more focused on Gen-Z cinephiles than middle-age Academy members.

Which is why, weirdly, I think the Original Recipe Timmy might have just as good a case for an “It’s his year” in Best Actor. DiCaprio spent the first 20 years of his career being snubbed by Oscar voters, and his trophy cabinet’s looking pretty threadbare compared to his reputation. Shouldn’t he have more than one Oscar, the argument might go, and if so, isn’t now the time to give him his second? You may say Leo was overshadowed by his castmates; I say, “How many Bob Ferguson costumes did you see at Halloween this year?” He created an instantly iconic character in what’s shaping up to be the biggest awards movie of the season — there’s a narrative to be had here if DiCaprio, never the most dedicated campaigner, wants to grab it.

And what of the other major contender in Best Actor, Michael B. Jordan, who can claim as much credit as Coogler for making Sinners a sensation? He’s a huge star who’s never been honored by the Academy before, and there’s two of him. Couldn’t that make it “his year”? He’s halfway between Timmy and Leo — a veteran who’s also of the moment — though does that mean he’s the best of both worlds, or stuck in no-man’s-land?

J.R.: On the subject of Leo, I want to answer two of your questions in the reverse order of which you posed them: “How many Bob Ferguson costumes did you see at Halloween this year?” Well, lots, because the Bob Ferguson costume is a bathrobe, a knit hat, some blue blockers, and a dingy T-shirt and slacks. This is like how my best idea for a group Halloween costume was to get a bunch of friends together, dress normal, and go as the newsroom from Spotlight. As for “Shouldn’t Leo have two Oscars by now?”, this is my favorite kind of Oscar argument. If Daniel Day-Lewis and Frances McDormand have three, shouldn’t Leo have two? I think the answer is yes. And the above two examples — plus more recent second wins by Adrien Brody, Emma Stone, Anthony Hopkins, and Renée Zellweger — are proof that the Academy is less reluctant to bestow second or third Oscars than they used to be.

I like your Michael B. Jordan argument, and I’m intrigued by the possibility that he could take advantage of an even split between Timmy and Leo supporters and ride to victory. I’d feel more optimistic if Sinners were more The Michael B. Jordan Show, but he doesn’t dominate the way that, say, Ariana Grande does in Wicked: For Good. That sequel hasn’t been enjoying as pink and sparkly a reception among critics as the first one did, but most reviews point to Grande’s Glinda as the film’s highlight. And after two years’ worth of viral press appearances and the near-universal agreement that she’s even more talented than we may have thought, it feels like it’s been her time for a minute now. Certainly there will be quibbles about whether a second nomination in two years is overkill, or whether For Good is just plain not good enough of a movie to produce an Oscar winner. But you can already feel the exception being carved out for Grande. And with the rest of the Supporting Actress field crammed with pairs of actresses from the same movie cannibalizing each other’s votes (Hailee Steinfeld and Wunmi Mosaku from Sinners; Elle Fanning and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleas from Sentimental Value; Teyana Taylor and Regina Hall from One Battle After Another), it’s a lot less complicated to just surrender to the girl in the bubble.

Speaking of surrender, does the fact that the Oscar-observant community is forming a consensus around Hamnet’s Jessie Buckley as Best Actress make this her moment by default? Or should we be talking about how this year feels like the result of several years of steadily breaking through?

N.J.: I think it can be both! Jessie Buckley in Hamnet feels to me like the closest thing we’ve seen recently to a J.Law moment. She’s not exactly an unknown — like Lawrence at the time of Silver Linings Playbook, she’s already a previous nominee — but her performance in Chloé Zhao’s film marks her transformation over a few short years from admired indie actress to everyone’s favorite new star. At the same time, her situation illustrates how much context matters when we declare it someone’s “year.” Ahead of the season, insiders were already whispering that this was a weak Best Actress field, so once Buckley wowed the crowds at Telluride, it was easier for pundits to simply call it early and move on to more interesting races. And without casting any aspersions on her performance, she’s also benefitting from the way the category has shaken out. The same way Brad Pitt’s path to an Oscar for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood was made easier once he was nominated against four previous winners, Buckley is going up against performances that are superficially similar — traumatized moms like Rose Byrne in If I Had Legs I’d Kick You and Jennifer Lawrence in Die, My Love, plus another grief-stricken Olde Englander in The Testament of Ann Lee’s Amanda Seyfried — from films that are way less audience-friendly than Hamnet.

But talking about an actor who’s seen everything align for her this year also brings to mind a few awards hopefuls who haven’t been so lucky. There are two guys who, if you’d have asked me in August, I would have said were looking forward to it being “their year”: Jesse Plemons in Bugonia and Adam Sandler in Jay Kelly. Plemons seemed like he was on track to be the male Jessie Buckley, an actor who was highly regarded within the industry, previously nominated for a supporting performance, getting a plumb role in a two-hander acting showcase. Was he finally making the leap? Sandler, meanwhile, had preheated his Supporting Actor campaign with a charming appearance at March’s Oscar ceremony and was reuniting with Noah Baumbach, who directed one of his career-best performances in The Meyerowitz Stories. The stage was set for a “We never appreciated him enough” campaign, which is of course a subvariation of “It’s his year.” Bugonia and Jay Kelly both premiered in Venice, and while each received some positive reviews, neither was met with effusive acclaim. Plemons and Sandler could still both get nominated, but any sense that it is “their time” has dissipated.

Sandler’s Supporting Actor bid in particular had the bad luck to go up against two different types of “It’s his year” campaigns: Stellan Skarsgård in Sentimental Value and Benicio del Toro in One Battle After Another. Joe, who ya got?

J.R.: Stellan Skarsgård is an interesting case for an “It’s his time” Oscar. We’ve seen character actors pull off that narrative before — I’m thinking specifically of J.K. Simmons in Whiplash. In that case, Simmons played such a forceful, dynamic character that it was hard to deny his impact. Skarsgård feels a bit more like an Alan Arkin type: endearing older actor making his mark within an ensemble in a Best Picture nominee. That being said, I don’t think Alan Arkin ever laid claim to an “It’s his time” narrative when he won for Little Miss Sunshine, so maybe that tells me everything about Skarsgård’s chances to do the same. Maybe his first-ever Oscar nomination will be enough.

Benicio del Toro, on the other hand … It might be his year. Despite being surrounded by actors giving bigger, more bombastic performances in One Battle After Another, the word of mouth was immediately strong for del Toro’s disarmingly quiet, funny, “a few small beers”–enjoying performance. The more you think about One Battle, it’s del Toro’s sensei, Sergio, who carries off the film’s themes of resistance on a community level. His Oscar win for Traffic came 25 years ago, and he’s certainly attained the level of respect in the industry to warrant a second, especially if One Battle ends up as the Best Picture winner. Getting two actors from the same movie to win second Oscars would be an exceedingly rare feat, so maybe we’re talking either-or for Leo or Benicio.

What’s fun about the Oscar race is that the “It’s their year” picture becomes clearer as the season rolls on. In the next few weeks, the critics will have their say, with the New York Film Critics Circle, Los Angeles Film Critics Association, and National Board of Review announcing their winners. Theirs won’t be the final word on the subject — it can be your year even if the critics don’t agree — but I think they can push a few narratives forward. Anyone you’re keeping an eye on for critics awards?

N.J.: You mentioned that Grande has become the Supporting Actress front-runner almost by default. But what if I told you there was another well-respected veteran, a previous nominee in fact, hiding in plain sight and ready to stake a claim that, actually, it’s her time? I’m talking about Amy Madigan of Weapons, who feels primed for a left-field critics-group win that vaults her into Oscar contention. Madigan feels so perfect a New York Film Critics Circle pick that, in the event the NYFCC goes elsewhere, the only reason would be a fear of being obvious.

Every week between now and January 22, when the nominations for the Academy Awards are announced, Vulture will consult its crystal ball to determine the changing fortunes in this year’s Oscar race. In our “Oscar Futures” column, we’ll let you in on insider gossip, parse brand-new developments, and track industry buzz to figure out who’s up, who’s down, and who’s currently leading the race for a coveted Oscar nomination.

The TIFF People’s Choice Award winner hit theaters this week under the cloud of becoming, if not yet the season’s official Oscar villain, then at least the official Oscar punchline. None of that looks likely to dent Hamnet’s awards fortunes at the moment: The Tudor tearjerker has plenty of fans among industry types I talk to, and even viewers allergic to its woo-woo nonsense (ahem) may ultimately find themselves a little misty by the end. If Chloé Zhao’s film winds up one of the year’s major Oscar players — it should, since it’s being put out by Focus, and not Tubi — that’ll be worth suffering the slings and arrows of outrageous Twitter jokes.

A $147 million opening — 30 percent higher than its predecessor — is just what the musical needed to maintain its Best Picture bona fides, especially since so many other awards hopefuls crashed and burned at the fall box office. But those boffo receipts came alongside mixed reviews, which all but kills For Good’s already-slim chances of pulling a Return of the King–style win for the series as a whole. The sequel’s best chance at an above-the-line trophy will come in another category.

Frankenstein, Hamnet, Is This Thing On?, It Was Just an Accident, Jay Kelly, Marty Supreme, One Battle After Another, Sentimental Value, Sinners, Train Dreams

Skim the generally positive Hamnet reviews, like Justin Chang’s, and note critics’ side-eyes regarding Zhao’s “forceful, sometimes pushy emotionalism.” Says Chang: “The movie whispers poetic sublimities in your ear one minute and tosses its prestige ambitions in your face the next.” (He also quips, “What is Hamnet, or Hamlet, without a little ham?” Get thee to a punnery!) The lady doth impress too much? Maybe so, but if there’s one thing you can say about a director who leads breathing exercises before screenings, she is certainly to her own self being true.

Chu has cemented his reputation as one of Hollywood’s most reliable IP guys, which is not exactly an honor the directors’ branch holds in high regard. If a nom didn’t happen last year, it’s not gonna happen this year.

Paul Thomas Anderson, One Battle After Another; Ryan Coogler, Sinners; Jafar Panahi, It Was Just an Accident; Joachim Trier, Sentimental Value; Chloé Zhao, Hamnet

With the Rock and Jeremy Allen White dropping down the ranks, could there be space for an international contender like Moura, who won Best Actor at Cannes for his turn in this Brazilian political thriller? Neon certainly thinks so, bringing Moura out to schmooze with critics groups last week. It helps that the actor, who lives in L.A., is a familiar face from Narcos — he even has his own meme — and that reviews have been strong in limited release. (Melissa Anderson calls him “so spellbinding that he constitutes his own magnetic field.”) Neon is juggling a lot of foreign-language entries, but Moura is its No. 1 priority in this race.

For the first two hours or so of Marty Supreme, I was skeptical of all the headlines proclaiming this Timmy’s year. A charismatic, live-wire performance? Sure. But wasn’t this reptilian oddball simply too unsympathetic a part to catapult young Chalamet to Oscar glory? I won’t spoil what happened next, but let’s just say that, by the movie’s final shot, I no longer had those concerns.

Timothée Chalamet, Marty Supreme; Leonardo DiCaprio, One Battle After Another; Ethan Hawke, Blue Moon; Michael B. Jordan, Sinners; Wagner Moura, The Secret Agent

“The usual adjectives barely seem adequate when discussing Buckley’s extraordinary performance,” says Keith Phipps, who echoes his fellow critics in declaring this Buckley’s film: “Shakespeare’s wife may remain forever a mystery, but Hamnet makes Agnes a creation of yearning, aching humanity who’s impossible to forget.” We’ll see how the sense of inevitability holds up over the course of the season, but for now, even rival campaigns are operating under the assumption that this is Buckley’s year.

Erivo has been pencilled in for a follow-up nod for the past 12 months, but I’m joining Joe in holding space for the possibility that she could miss out. Her character takes a backseat in the sequel, and while Part One ended with Erivo’s thunderous “Defying Gravity,” For Good’s titular number turns into a showcase for Ariana Grande. At least she’ll always have the sex cardigan.

Jessie Buckley, Hamnet; Rose Byrne, If I Had Legs I’d Kick You; Cynthia Erivo, Wicked: For Good; Renate Reinsve, Sentimental Value; Amanda Seyfried, The Testament of Ann Lee

Alas, poor Mescal! I knew him, Vulture reader; a fellow that Dana Stevens thinks was miscast. (She feels his character’s “rough edges are largely sanded off” by the actor’s “heart-on-his-sleeve expressiveness.”) Still, Alyssa Wilkinson declares he “knocked me flat.” Hamnet is strong enough — and the role emotive enough — that Mescal and Buckley will probably be considered a package deal. Recall, though, that Joseph Fiennes was not nominated for Shakespeare in Love. Will Shakespeare in Grief fare better?

Who did Stevens wish would have played Shakespeare instead? None other than Mescal’s History of Sound co-star, who also pops up this week for the Knives Out threequel’s limited run in theaters. Despite sending increasingly frantic emails to Netflix, I’m still waiting to see it, but critics like John Nugent say his turn as a priest “brilliantly” walks a “tonal tightrope between unprocessed inner darkness, youthful befuddlement and gentle decency.” It didn’t happen for Ana de Armas, and it didn’t happen for Janelle Monáe, so anyone predicting O’Connor must do so on faith.

Benicio del Toro, One Battle After Another; Delroy Lindo, Sinners; Paul Mescal, Hamnet; Sean Penn, One Battle After Another; Stellan Skarsgård, Sentimental Value

Is she gonna be pop-uUu-lar? (Sorry, wrong installment.) As Joe mentioned above, this category is so unsettled, and so rife with internal competition, that Grande feels like the front-runner almost by default. Think of it this way: By rewarding her, it’s almost like they’d be awarding two press tours for the price of one.

Credit to Josh Safdie and casting director Jennifer Venditti for filling this ’50s period piece with the most never-seen-a-cell-phone faces put onscreen this year. The only exception is Gwyneth, who never quite un-Goop-ifies herself as an aging silver-screen star. It works for the character, though.

Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas, Sentimental Value; Amy Madigan, Weapons; Wunmi Mosaku, Sinners; Ariana Grande, Wicked: For Good; Teyana Taylor, One Battle After Another

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