LOS ANGELES, USA – Did Emilia Perez star Karla Sofia Gascon’s old inflammatory social media posts really kill her film’s Oscar chances? And who will win the Oscars this Sunday night, March 2 (Monday morning, March 3, Manila time)?
Most of January, Jacques Audiard’s film about the suddenly intertwined lives of a Mexican cartel leader (Karla) and a lawyer (Zoe Saldana) appeared to be one of the Academy Best Picture frontrunners. At the Golden Globe Awards on January 5, Emilia Perez romped off with four wins, including Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy.
Then on January 23, the crime musical nabbed a whopping 13 Oscar nominations, setting the record for the most Academy nods for a non-English language film. By then, Emilia Perez appeared to have locked in its status as the film to beat come Oscars show time.
Karla, nominated for Best Actress for her take on a crime boss transitioning into a woman, made history as the first openly transgender woman to be nominated in any Academy acting category.
But on January 30, freelance journalist Sarah Hagi tweeted about Karla’s old tweets on X (formerly Twitter), from 2016 to the early 2020s, that she uncovered. The revelations of Karla’s racist, Islamophobic posts immediately caused an uproar.
Suddenly, Netflix’s momentum for a shot at its first Oscar Best Picture gold trophy stalled.
In a bid to salvage its Oscars campaign, Netflix distanced itself from Karla. The streaming giant did not include the Spanish actress in the rest of Emilia Perez’s promo campaign and awards season appearances.
The 52-year-old has not been seen in the hectic awards season circuit leading to the Academy’s big night in Hollywood. The Madrid native did not attend the Class of 2025 nominees dinner last February 25. Over 100 Oscar hopefuls gathered in a convivial atmosphere and posed for the traditional class photo.
Earlier, Zoe and Jacques spoke out about the controversy stirred by Karla’s resurfaced tweets on various topics, from Muslims, Black Lives Matter, and George Floyd, who was murdered.
In a panel, Zoe did not directly address Karla’s posts but she was quoted as saying, “It makes me really sad because I don’t support and I don’t have any tolerance for any negative rhetoric towards people of any group.”
“I can only attest to the experience that I had with each and every individual that was a part of this film, and my experience and my interactions with them were about inclusivity and collaboration and racial, cultural, and gender equity. And it just saddens me.”
Jacques, in an interview, said, “It’s very hard for me to think back to the work I did with Karla Sofía. The trust we shared, the exceptional atmosphere that we had on the set that was indeed based on trust.”
“And when you have that kind of relationship and suddenly you read something that that person has said, things that are absolutely hateful and worthy of being hated, of course that relationship is affected. It’s as if you fall into a hole. Because what Karla Sofía said is inexcusable.”
Karla herself apologized in a statement: “I want to acknowledge the conversation around my past social media posts that have caused hurt. As someone in a marginalized community, I know this suffering all too well and I am deeply sorry to those I have caused pain. All my life, I have fought for a better world. I believe light will always triumph over darkness.”
Karla has since deactivated her X account but the uproar may have dealt a serious blow to Emilia Perez’s Oscar gold chances.
After its sweep of the Producers Guild of America (PGA) and Directors Guild of America (DGA) awards, two usually reliable bellwethers of the Academy Best Picture prize winner, and then also winning the Independent Spirit Awards’ Best Feature plum, Sean Baker’s Anora now appears to be the frontrunner.
Anora could only be the fourth Palme d’Or winner to go on to win the Academy Best Picture laurels, joining Bong Joon Ho’s Parasite, Delbert Mann’s Marty, and Billy Wilder’s The Lost Weekend, according to VegasInsider.com.
But Edward Berger’s Conclave, the papacy power grab thriller drama with excellent performances led by Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci, Isabella Rossellini, and John Lithgow, may pull a surprise. The cast recently bagged the Screen Actors Guild’s (SAG) top prize, Outstanding Movie Ensemble.
Anora’s Mikey Madison (as a New York sex worker who falls for a Russian oligarch’s son) and The Substance’s Demi Moore (as an aging actress who resorts to a questionable drug to revert to her younger self), who have been alternately winning in the various awards giving bodies, loom as the top Best Actress contenders.
But if I’m Still Here’s Fernanda Torres pulls an upset, like she did at the Golden Globes, she will be the first Brazilian to claim the Academy statuette for Best Actress.
Adrien Brody, playing a Hungarian architect who survived the Holocaust and immigrated to America in The Brutalist, looked like the man to beat as he swept the Best Actor honors one after another until Timothee Chalamet recently threw a monkey wrench in Brody’s way.
Timothee’s portrayal of rock icon Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown resonated with the Screen Actors Guild, which made him its youngest Best Actor winner.
If Timothee, 29, wins, he will also make history as the youngest Oscar Best Actor winner. Timothee being crowned by the actors group may give him an edge over Brody on Sunday evening.
Zoe thankfully has not been affected by the Karla imbroglio. As a lawyer who helps a drug lord transition into a new life, Zoe is the clear Best Supporting Actress frontrunner, after dominating the Golden Globes, British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA), and SAG.
Wicked’s Ariana Grande and Conclave’s Isabella Rossellini are the spoilers. If the latter prevails, she becomes the first Italian actress to score a Best Supporting Actress Oscar.
Having also swept the Best Supporting Actor honors in the above awards races for playing Jesse Eisenberg’s free-spirited cousin in A Real Pain, Kieran Culkin appears to be a favorite to win this category at the Oscars.
In case Yuri Borisov, who portrays a thug with a heart in Anora, pulls a shocker, he will be the first Russian to cinch the Academy’s Best Supporting Actor honors.
The Brutalist’s Brady Corbet romped off with the Best Director laurels early in the awards season, but when Sean Baker cinched DGA and PGA wins, many pundits are now betting on the Anora filmmaker.
If Sean does win his first Oscar, expect the boyish-looking filmmaker to make an impassioned speech for indie films, like he recently did when he won Best Director at the Film Independent Spirit Awards:
“Indie film is struggling right now, more than ever. Gone are the days of DVD sales that allow for greater risk to be taken on challenging films. That revenue stream is gone and the only way to see significant backend is to have a box office hit with profits that far exceed what any of our films will ever see, unless you are Damien Leone and strike gold with a franchise like Terrifier.”
“But as we all know, that’s an extreme rarity for me, and I think for many of my peers,” he added. “If we’re lucky, the average number of years dedicated to making a film is around three. I think most of us have worked a lot longer on our films but let’s go with three.”
Sean shares his passion for social realism and depicting marginalized communities with the late Filipino great Lino Brocka, whose restored Bona classic he made sure to watch in last year’s Cannes Film Festival.
Will Emilia Perez still triumph in the Best International Feature film derby? Awards prognosticators think so. Walter Salles’ I’m Still Here, a compelling drama about a family dealing with political oppression in 1970s Brazil, could be a spoiler.
The Best Animated Feature race is a fight between Gints Zilbalodis’ Flow, a beautiful, lyrical portrait of a solitary cat’s journey in the aftermath of a great flood and Chris Sanders’ The Wild Robot, a moving tale about a lost robot and an orphaned gosling.
Flow made history as the first Latvian film to win the Golden Globes’ Best Animated Feature award. People queued in long lines to see the Globe trophy displayed at the Latvian National Museum of Art.
The visually stunning film is also in the running for the Oscars’ Best International Feature contest.
Will Sunday evening finally see songwriter Diane Warren bring home that gleaming gold Oscar man? Diane, nominated again for Best Original Song for The Journey from The Six Triple Eight, is tied with recording mixer Greg P. Russell for the most nominated individual without a competitive win. They each have 16 nods.
As the 97th Academy Awards nears, news broke out that Karla will attend the star-studded event at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood and that Netflix will pay for her expenses. Emilia Perez may have a happy ending, after all.
– Rappler.com