The Envelope, February 04, 2025

WHY

COLMAN DOMINGO A S P ECI AL IS S U E OF T HE

GIVES ‘SING SING’ ALL OF HIMSELF

F EBRU ARY 4, 2025 VOL. CX L I V NO .63

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ACADEMY AWARD NOMINATIONS

BEST PICTURE CYNTHIA ERIVO B EST AC TTRESS RESS

ARIANA GRANDE BE S STT S U UPPORT PPORTING I NG ACTRESS AC T RESS

“ THE SCREEN HAS R ARELY SEEN – OR HEARD –

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r for m ances LIKE THOSE DELIVERED BY C YNTHIA ERIVO AND ARIANA GR ANDE.”

5 SAG AWARDS

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N O M I N AT I O N S O U T S TA N D I N G P E R F O R M A N C E BY A F E M A L E ac t o r I N A L E A D I N G R O L E C Y N T H I A ERIV O

O U T S TA N D I N G P E R F O R M A N C E BY A F E M A L E ac t o R I N A s u p p o r t i n g R O L E AR RIAN I AN A GRANDE

O U T S TA N D I N G P E R F O R M A N C E BY A M A L E ac t o r I N A s u p p o r t i n g R O L E J ON AT A T H AN BAIL BA ILEY EY

O U T S TA N D I N G P E R F O R M A N C E BY A cast IN A motion picture ONA B A I L EY • M ARIS S A BODE • P E ETT E R DIN K L AG E J ON A TTHA HA N BA CYN T HI A ERI V O • J EFF GOLDBLU M • A R I AN A G R A N DE E ETTH HA A N SLATER • B BOWEN O WEN YAN G • M IC H E L L E YEOH

O U T S TA N D I N G AC T I O N P E R F O R M A N C E BY A Stunt Ensemble IN A Motion Picture

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What’s inside

p 33 RALPH FIENNES

p 12 MONICA BARBARO

p 40 FOCUS FEATURES

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WHY

COLMAN DOMINGO A SP ECIA L IS S U E OF TH E

GIVES ‘SING SING’ ALL OF HIMSELF

FEBRUA RY 4 , 2025 VO L. CXL IV NO. 63

Cover photo by Shayan Asgharnia For The Times

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THE CONTENDERS

THE SPOTLIGHT

THE INDUSTRY

The Envelope speaks with composer Daniel Blumberg (p 14) about lugging recording equipment across Europe to collaborate with world­class musicians on the original score for director Brady Corbet’s sweeping film “The Brutalist.”

A Deeper Dive (p 26) looks back on the classic acting performances that were surprisingly overlooked by the Oscars.

How Nathan Crowley (p 30) brought some realism to the fantasy land of Oz through the magic of practical effects.

Both “Wicked” and “Dune: Part Two” exceed the 2 ½­hour mark yet have managed to earn hundreds of millions in box­office returns and score best picture nods. But they’re still a far cry from the success of past lengthy films (p 42).

COVER STORY “Sing Sing” actor Colman Domingo on the challenge of honoring the stories of formerly incarcerated men, the power of art to heal and why Shakespeare’s words still resonate with him today. p 16

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BUZZMETER

GOLD STANDARD

NATALIA AGATTE FOR THE TIMES; AIDAN MONAGHAN FOCUS FEATURES; JENNIFER McCORD FOR THE TIMES

AIDAN MONAGHAN FOCUS FEATURES

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International Feature “Emilia Pérez” (France) “I’m Still Here” (Brazil) “The Seed of the Sacred Fig” (Germany) “Flow” (Latvia) “The Girl With the Needle” (Denmark)

BuzzMeter

‘EMILIA PÉREZ’ FRANCE’S “EMILIA PÉREZ” REMAINS THE BUZZMETER PANEL’S CONSENSUS PICK ATOP THE INTERNATIONAL

field, but with two other nominees also receiving major Oscar recognition, this no longer looks like the runaway race it once did. Brazil’s “I’m Still Here” joins the French frontrunner as a dou­ ble nominee — with nods in both the international category and as best picture. And Latvia’s “Flow” doubles up its international nomination with a nod in the animated feature category as well. Still, “Emilia Pérez” led all comers with 13 nominations, so the unique story of a drug king­ pin is still expected to triumph: “Its historic overall performance means it’ll likely become the first musical winner in this category since 1959,” says panelist Dave Karger.

GLENN WHIPP

Los Angeles Times

You can find all our picks at latimes.com/ buzzmeter

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Our Oscar experts share their picks

Both “Emilia Pérez” and “I’m Still Here” picked up nomina­ tions for best picture as well, the first time two movies have shared that distinction in the same year. It’s hard to pick against “Emilia Pérez,” though, as it pulled in a leading 13 nods.

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ANNE THOMPSON IndieWire

“Emilia Pérez” should win both supporting actress (Zoe Sal­ daña) and international feature film. But it’s unusual to see two international films landing best picture nominations, so Walter Salles’ “I’m Still Here” could prove a category spoiler.

AMY NICHOLSON Los Angeles Times

It’s possible 13 nominations will prove an unlucky number for “Emilia Pérez.” Yes, it’s the diva with the most nods. But a win here could mean voters feel they’ve given it enough flowers — and it will end the night sing­ ing a tragic aria.

DAVE KARGER

Turner Classic Movies The inclusion of “I’m Still Here” in the best picture lineup means this isn’t as much of a lock for “Emilia Pérez” as originally thought. But its historic overall performance means it’ll likely become the first musical win­ ner in this category since 1959.

P A GE 114 / WH Y N O T P R OD U C T I ON S / P A T H É F I L M S / F R A NC E 2 C I NÉ M A ; I LL US T R A T I ON S BY K AG AN MC LE OD FOR T HE T IME S

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Daniel Blumberg p 14 COVER STORY: Colman Domingo p 16

MONICA BARBARO p 12 Photograph

by Jennifer McCord For The Times

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Monica Barbaro on the doomed romance in ‘A Complete Unknown’ The actor understands why Joan Baez the voice and Bob Dylan the poet were a seemingly perfect match

Story by Jordan Riefe ■ Photograph by Jennifer McCord For The Times

↓ Joan Baez (Monica Bar­ baro) and Bob Dylan (Timothée Chalamet) in “A Complete Unknown.”

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OAN IS YOURS.” THAT’S WHAT

the email from director James Mangold to Monica Barbaro said. The actor had sent in her audition tape for the role of folk legend Joan Baez in “A Complete Un­ known,” the story of Bob Dylan’s arrival on the folk scene. After learning that she’d made the shortlist, Barbaro was to meet with Mangold in March 2020, but it wasn’t until after the pandemic, in 2023, that they finally did.

The good news? She’d got the part. The bad news? Well, she got the part. Now that she had it, she had to learn to play the gui­ tar and sing … in a voice a few octaves higher than her usual.

“Every conversation about Joan’s voice, you hear about her vibrato, the key she sings in and the angelic quality. It was about getting those things so it was rec­ ognizable,” recalls Barbaro, a supporting actress Oscar nominee — one of the film’s eight nods, including best picture. “I leaned into getting as close to her as pos­ sible. And on the day, you put the prepara­ tion on the shelf and receive the person in front of you in a real authentic moment.”

Barbaro didn’t meet with 84­year­old

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Baez but did get some phone time with her and found her to be kind and forthright.

“It’s about authenticity. Joan was very ap­ proachable in the research. She reveals so much about herself. I didn’t have to cut through a lot of self­congratulatory B.S. to find what makes her tick.”

Dylan was still establishing himself in the Greenwich Village folk scene when he met Baez, by then a star. “She had a very complicated relationship with fame in that it didn’t really sit right with her,” notes Bar­ baro. “I think it bumped against her values, and she was looking for lyrics that were saying something so she could put this platform she had into doing some good.”

Dylan’s talent as a songwriter was im­ mediately apparent to Baez, and before long they fell into each other’s arms, de­ spite his longtime relationship with Suze Rotolo, represented in the film by fic­ tional character Sylvie Russo (Elle Fan­ ning). In a pivotal scene, Baez wakes up next to Dylan (Timothée Chalamet) after their first night together. She harmonizes while he sketches out a new song called “Blowin’ in the Wind.”

“There are so many components to that scene; it’s multiple pages too. We shot that for 14 hours,” Bar­ baro says with a sigh about filming in tem­ peratures some­ times topping 100 degrees under the lights. It was her final scene on the film and the most intimate.

“It has to be so raw, first thing in the morning, finding your voice and find­ ing each other’s voice. She’s seeing the words for the first time, but she’s also a talented musi­ cian and knows how to pick up the melo­ dy and harmonize and play. He’s in the

corner on his bed, noodling [on] the guitar, being kind of a d—. But for me, the one thing I wanted to make sure to have was the impact of his writing on her.”

Dylan and Baez were romantically linked until his 1965 U.K. tour (which is not in “A Complete Unknown” but is immor­ talized in D.A. Pennebaker’s documentary “Don’t Look Back”). Accompanying him months later at the Newport Folk Festival, where he went electric (the new movie’s climax), Baez flips him the bird.

“She fell in love with the poet, the per­ son willing to say what he was willing to say. I think she fell in love with the words themselves and how he was saying things she was trying to find the words for,” says Barbaro about the doomed relationship.

“She talked about how there was a mother­child dynamic between them too.

And they were so young. If I try to unpack my relationships at 20 ... I can’t imagine that being inspected on a public level for decades to come.”

Originally from San Francisco, Barbaro grew up in the Bay Area suburb of Mill Valley, where she began dancing at an early age and went on to study ballet.

Graduating NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts in 2010, she decided to pursue act­ ing, finding work on such shows as Life­ time’s “UnREAL” and NBC’s “Chicago Justice,” and eventually landing the role of Lt. Natasha “Phoenix” Trace in “Top Gun: Maverick” alongside Tom Cruise.

“My experience with Timothée and Tom is that they work tirelessly at being good at what their characters are good at,” she says, comparing her two leading actors. “It’s an all­consuming profession because you have to learn skills in a matter of months as if you’ve been doing them for decades.”

A few weeks ago, Barbaro learned of a thing called an Oscar shortlist. A few days later, she learned she was on it. “I was mid­ fitting for another project,” she recalls of the day of the nominations. “My publicist asked if I’d be available to talk at the time.

I’m not going to change around my day and sit by my phone. I was going to play it cool. The next thing I knew, my phone was blowing up with congratulations. It’s mind­blowing. Sometimes people will say, ‘Academy Award nominee Monica Bar­ baro,’ and it stops me, whoa!”

Dylan and Baez sang about the issues of their time — social justice, war, racism — issues that persist today. “It was only 60 years ago. Human evolution takes time,” says Barbaro, wondering if in some ways the times, they aren’t a changin’.

“I like to be optimistic, but some days, politically speaking, my optimism is through the floor. The coolest thing about this film is getting to see audiences who lived then and [see them] feel like their time was understood.”

S E A R C H L I GH T PI CT U R E S

The Contenders Actor

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Story by Tim Greiving

Daniel Blumberg traversed Europe to build ‘The Brutalist’s’ epic sound Scoring Brady Corbet’s film took composer from Berlin kitchens to Carrara quarry

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ILANA BLUMBERG

The Contenders Composer

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HE SCORE FOR “THE

Brutalist” is itself a feat of ar­ chitectural engineering.

Composing only his sec­ ond feature film, Daniel Blumberg gathered solos, performances and improvisations from instrumentalists all over Europe — from the garden studio of an octogenarian pianist on the southern coast of England, to a posh studio in Paris, to musicians’ flats and kitchens in Berlin and elsewhere — and assembled them into an imposing cathedral of sound that matches the scale of Brady Corbet’s VistaVision epic.

Tracking Adrien Brody’s Hungarian architect (the fictional László Tóth) from his arrival at Ellis Island sometime after World War II, Blumberg’s score asserts it­ self immediately with the musical thrum of construction — achieved with a ham­ mer­like rhythm on prepared piano — and the churning, chaotic sound of industry by way of a warmly masculine brass anthem and all kinds of clacks, saws and snarls from his ragtag “orchestra.”

“Brady always talked about this collage aspect,” says Blumberg, referring to the film’s mix of 35mm and digital formats with archival footage. The musician’s own instincts already leaned that way, and when he started thinking about the score, “It’s not like, ‘Oh, I want the trumpet on this.’ It’s like, ‘Axel Dörner would be per­ fect for this,’ ” he says of the trumpet mas­ ter he recorded in Berlin.

The composer assembled a dream team of musicians, many of whom were al­ ready friends or mutual friends — or, in the case of 88­year­old John Tilbury, a longtime hero. Blumberg took his portable recording equipment to them partly out of necessity; Tilbury doesn’t travel, and Sophie Agnel, another accomplished pia­ nist, had restrictions on her busy schedule.

But this also led to more free­form experi­ mentation, allowing the musicians to really express themselves.

And even the space itself became part of the music. It was pouring rain one day on the roof of Tilbury’s kitchen shed, which caused Blumberg to worry. The pia­ nist said: “I can do a duo with the rain.”

Blumberg said: “I know — I’ve got your record where you do a duo with the dust.”

“But in the end,” Blumberg says, “it was just beautiful, and we used it.”

(That “duo” is best heard in the scene where Tóth and his crew build a library for Guy Pearce’s character, Harrison Lee Van Buren.)

Blumberg is a somewhat shy, 34­year­ old singer and multi­instrumentalist from London who, for the last two decades, has recorded albums in various bands and as a solo artist, and whose only clear through­ line is raw emotion and sonic experimen­

tation. He met the American Corbet 10 years ago when the former actor was working on his directorial debut, “The Childhood of a Leader.” They hit it off in­ stantly — Corbet stayed on Blumberg’s sofa the first night they met — and every time Blumberg finished a new record, he would discuss it with Corbet.

Even before scoring his first film, “The World to Come,” in 2020 (directed by Mona Fastvold, Corbet’s partner), Blum­ berg was expecting to score Corbet’s am­ bitious throwback opus. They began dis­ cussing it years ago in its initial pre­ production stage before the pandemic, when the project was temporarily scuttled and recast. The score was under construc­ tion before and alongside the picture, and Corbet always said he wanted to shoot some of his movie to the music.

The piece that underscores Tóth’s cha­ otic opening moments, from below deck of a ship to his sight of an upside­down Statue of Liberty, was actually a demo that Blumberg made in his London flat. Corbet amplified the track on set, and cinemato­ grapher Lol Crawley was “kind of moving with the music,” explains Blumberg, “and

“I’M ALWAYS JUST SORT OF BASHING AWAY, TRYING TO FIND CHORDS.” Daniel Blumberg

↓ Actors Guy Pearce, left, Adrien Brody and Isaach de Bankolé in “The Brutalist.”

the choreography of Adrien and the ex­ tras. They were all moving like a kind of dance.” (Blumberg later improved the track with his virtuoso musicians.)

The sound of searching was baked into the score. Blumberg doesn’t read or write music, so “I’m always just sort of bashing away, trying to find chords,” he says.

“Brady heard me in my room doing that, and he came in and he was like, ‘I mean, that’s literally the sound of someone work­ ing something out. That’s what we want to try and retain.’ ” “A lot of the temp was done to these kind of weird recordings,” Blumberg says with a laugh, “where I’m, like, dropping my vape on the floor.”

To retain that spirit, he put a micro­ phone on Tilbury himself, to capture the sound of the pianist adjusting in his chair or breathing; if you listen closely during the film’s intermission, you can actually hear Tilbury scribbling on his sheet music.

Both the film and its score achieved re­ markable scope and weight out of rela­ tively thin resources — there are no strings on the score — but perhaps the greatest length Blumberg went to was traveling to Carrara, Italy, where the scenes in its famous marble quarry had al­ ready been shot. He recorded the quarry’s unique impulse response (achieved by fir­ ing a gun), then applied that reverb onto a recording of his saxophone player, Evan Parker, that had been made in an office in Kent, England.

“We put Kent in Carrara,” says Blum­ berg — aptly summarizing his strange and towering achievement.

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BY TIM GREIVING

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← Actor Colman Domingo, star of “Sing Sing.”

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H E D AY Oscar nominations were announced. He was T jetlagged, having just returned to L.A. from Europe. He N looked up at the moon and felt that, despite the darkness of the fires and the country’s crazy politics and everything else going on — no matter what happens — the moon was there, and he was blessed. ¶ Two hours later, he found out he’d been nominated for his soul­baring performance in “Sing Sing.” ¶ We met just a few hours later at the sky­ scraping offices of A24 in West Hollywood, where Do­ mingo — 55, impeccably dressed, wide awake and in good humor — was waxing thoughtfully about the power of Shakespeare. ¶ “Shakespeare is someone who gives people confidence, I think, when it comes to language skills,” says Domingo, a Philadelphia native who has been acting for 34 years and who has done his fair share of board­treading with the Bard’s work. “I think why I’m not afraid of language in my work is because I’m rooted with a lot of Shakespeare. ... He’s giving you such great jumping­ off points to create whole worlds with language.” latimes.com/theenvelope

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He ponders it a little more, and adds: “I think Shakespeare would be a good buddy of mine. I think we’d have a couple beers together, and a good laugh.”

When I mention that I’ve always strug­ gled with Shakespeare because it feels like a foreign language, Domingo launches into a fully committed and physical recita­ tion, from memory, of a passage from “A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream” — about hopping fairies and blessing this palace with sweet peace.

“You understood that, didn’t you?” he says when he finishes, a twinkle in his eye, and it’s suddenly clear just how much of himself Domingo poured into his role in “Sing Sing.”

His character, John “Divine G” Whitfield, opens the film with another riveting speech from “Midsummer’s” — Lysander’s monologue about how “The course of true love never did run smooth” — which, the actor says, “tells you a lot about the character in the very first sen­ tence.” Whitfield is a very real person, for­ merly incarcerated and the product of the

Rehabilitation Through the Arts (RTA) program at Sing Sing Correctional Facility in New York. In conceiving his perform­ ance, Domingo saw Divine G as “the best of that program and what it can be.”

“When I was examining his level of skill,” Domingo says, “I thought: ‘He’s just a very raw actor. Not polished.’ ... But imagine if that raw talent was polished — it could be useful outside of the walls. You know, he can actually make a career for himself.

Which is what my co­star, Clarence Maclin, is doing.”

Maclin, a.k.a. “Divine Eye,” plays a version of himself in the film, which he also co­ wrote. He is one of several former inmates and RTA alumni who play themselves alongside Domingo and a handful of pro­ fessional actors, lending the whole produc­ tion a powerful authenticity. It also forced Domingo — who had very little time to pre­ pare to shoot the film in 18 days, between doing “The Color Purple” and reshoots on “Rustin” — to be more of his actual self than he’s ever been onscreen.

“I knew there needed to be sort of a

“NOTHING ABOUT IT IS BEING AN ACTIVIST OR POLITICAL IN ANY WAY. IF ANYTHING, IT’S THE ANTITHESIS OF THAT. IT’S VERY HUMAN.” Colman Domingo on “Sing Sing”

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sleight­of­hand,” he says. “But also, if I’m dealing with guys who had the real lived experience, and they’re bringing themselves and playing versions of them­ selves, to a certain extent I had to play a version of myself. I had to bring myself in every single way.”

For that reason, it’s hard for him to watch the film.

He’s seen the movie only twice; once in a rough cut and then again on an airplane. “When I would start to watch it, something would come up in me,” Domingo says. “I’m like: ‘I’m too emotional, and I can’t watch.’

And I had never felt that way about anything I’ve watched of my own — because usually I’m building a character. I think I felt too exposed,” in “Sing Sing.”

In the film, Divine G is the de facto leader of a group of men who stage plays at the maximum­secu­ rity prison. He’s a talented thespian who also writes plays; a gentle man, a mentor and a self­described jailhouse lawyer who is preparing for his parole hear­ ing. He recruits the much rougher­edged Divine Eye to join the RTA program, and despite their very differ­ ent temperaments and Divine Eye’s initial resistance to the vulnerability and unguarded emotions the pro­ gram elicits, they become unlikely friends.

In one scene, Divine Eye calls Divine G the N­word, and Divine G says they don’t use that word inside the group — instead, they call each other “beloved.” This was, in fact, a lesson the real Divine Eye taught Do­ mingo during one of their Zoom rehearsals, and Do­ mingo insisted they work it into the script.

“He said it just so carefree,” Domingo says. “And I was like: ‘Grown, tough, strong men in prison call each other “beloved.” ’ ” It was said so casually, Domingo notes, and yet was so impactful. “I thought that was key.”

“Sing Sing” illustrates the profound power of acting and the arts to heal the cracked and hardened hearts and bodies of men locked behind bars. It does so with­ out preaching or grandstanding, with the most gentle touch and feathery 35 mm cinematography by Pat Scola, who chose to use natural light and to focus on the “landscape” of these men’s faces as they alternate between parading in silly costumes and quietly visu­ alizing their happiest memories.

“I think it has a grace to it,” says Domingo, “a grace and an intelligence and a tenderness. And nothing about it is being an activist or political in any way. If anything, it’s the antithesis of that. It’s very human — so therefore it does become political, because you’re dealing with the people. So it takes care of that by just going more micro.”

Much of the film was shot in two real prisons — in­ cluding Downstate Correctional Facility in upstate New York, which had just been decommissioned two weeks before the cast arrived.

“So every ounce of it was very real,” Domingo says.

“The way the air did not flow. The cells. The colors. The layout of the land, where you can’t find your due north because it’s just set up that way. And you thought about what that does to you psychologically. And then you thought: ‘Well, this doesn’t feel like a place where anyone can heal or get better or contribute.’ ” For Domingo, putting on prison greens (which he

A 24

↙ Sean San Jose, right, stars with Domingo in “Sing Sing.”

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↙ Domingo hugs Clarence Maclin, center, while filming “Sing Sing.”

“THERE’S A VOLCANO DEEP INSIDE, AND ALSO AN ABYSS. I THINK HE’S SOMEONE WHO HAS HUNG ON AND CLUNG TO FAITH AND HOPE IN ART.”

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Domingo on his character, Divine G

wanted to be a little ill­fitting) was just an­ other costume, but for his castmates it was a true act of courage to get back into clothes, and an environment, from which they hoped they had been permanently freed — “but I know that they knew the impact it could have, a film like this,” he says.

Still, even he needed a bigger emotional safety net to do this project, which is why he requested that Sharon Washington play the parole board officer and Sean San Jose his fellow inmate, Mike Mike. “Those are my two closest friends on the planet,” says Domingo, who has known San Jose since the mid­’90s, when they were young actors together in San Francisco, bringing plays about the AIDS crisis to Bay Area students. He needed them, he says, be­ cause they “really held that space for me to be as vulnerable as possible,” he says.

“They know my heart.”

There’s a pivotal scene, midway through the film, where Divine G comes to his par­ ole hearing with a stack of envelopes and evidence, confident that a newly found re­

cording will exonerate him from the mur­ der that wrongly sent him to Sing Sing.

“He’s hopeful, and he’s open, and he’s also vulnerable,” Domingo says. “He’s all the things that the program has built him to be. There are trust exercises in the the­ ater, so I think he’s being trusting that this person will meet him where he’s meeting them, with the truth. But he almost forgot, I think, that he’s up against the cynicism of the world.”

It takes just one question from Wash­ ington’s character — asking if his sincer­ ity in the interview is actually a perform­ ance — “to just derail him, to take some­ thing that he’s been using as his soul work, and to question it,” he says. “It just disman­ tles him right there.”

Domingo didn’t plan how to act that scene, but running smack into the harsh reality of the system, the actor visibly de­ flates. “I tried to say something, but I had no words,” he explains. “Someone who always has something to say is rendered speechless.”

This heartbreaking moment, com­

pounded by another tragedy, causes Divine G to lose hope, and he becomes very quiet and almost catatonic when he’s back in rehearsals for the upcoming play — “I think because there’s a volcano deep inside, and also an abyss,” Domingo says. “I think he’s someone who has hung on and clung to faith and hope in art. And his hands can’t cling anymore. So he just goes to zero.”

In that state, the slightest disturbance — someone in the program taking his props, someone forgetting their line — sets him off, and Divine G erupts.

“It gets me emotional to think about it,” says Domin­ go, “but it’s like, this man’s life has been ruined — and many other folks’ too who’ve been wrongly incarcer­ ated. And you feel like you’re just a plaything for life.

And at some point, he’s like: ‘I can’t take it anymore.’

Even this gentle man will fall apart and get angry.”

After a shocking outburst and withdrawal, he is fi­ nally able to come back to the light thanks to the lessons of tenderness and compassion he’s been im­ parting to Divine Eye. In the film’s final scene, when Divine G has finally been released, Domingo walked up the road leaving the prison, again, he says, not pre­ meditating how he would react when he saw Maclin waiting to greet him. That scene had been rewritten many times, “overwritten” in Domingo’s opinion, and he asked: “Can we just try one without those words?”

The director, Greg Kwedar, said: “I’m going to trust what you and Clarence do.”

Domingo’s mind and heart were filling up with the character’s reality: Having been locked up for 25 years, he’s coming out to a world where his mother is gone and he doesn’t know who, if anyone, will be there for him. That’s when Maclin opened his big, manly arms for a hug.

“No, no, no, no — not with the weight of 25 years and what he’s thinking,” Domingo thought. “No, please don’t. I can’t. I can’t. I can’t. All that he’s been holding, all that he’s been holding. Clarence hugs me — and the sound that came out of me is a sound that I know I’ve only heard one other time out of my own body. And only people who understand this know that sound. It’s a guttural sound, and it’s a sound when you lose someone very dear to you ... like when I lost my mother. It’s a sound that I never want to hear again come out of my own body.”

But for Domingo, “Sing Sing” was worth the cost of how much he gave of himself. It’s a film that delights in the rare beauty of seeing adult men cry together, of trusting their hearts to each other and of recovering the childlike joy of play.

He tells me an anecdote about a young woman who said she started bawling when Sean Dino John­ son — one of the real former inmates — rolls around on the floor playing with a sword. He asked her why, and she said: “Because it’s something I wish for my father, for my brother, to allow themselves to play and be vulnerable, and how beautiful that is, and how that helps everybody.”

Domingo says this film is the most significant thing he has ever made. “It’s something that can really shift people’s hearts and minds,” he says. “It really can.”

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Production design: ‘Wicked’ p 30 Ralph Fiennes p 33 Gold Standard p 34 20 Years Back p 36

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The Spotlight A Deeper Dive

Don’t worry, snubbed actors. You’re part of a distinguished lot Some of the biggest screen stars of all time went their whole careers without taking home an Oscar

Story by James Brooks ■ Illustration by Adam McCauley For The Times

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HE 97TH ACADEMY AWARD

nominations have been an­ nounced and, sorry, Pamela, you’re not on the invite list.

But take comfort, you’re in very good company.

Every year brings the inevitable snubs when Oscar puts together its dance card.

Wags and critics in various circles this season were predicting that Pamela An­ derson (“The Last Showgirl”) or Daniel Craig (“Queer”) or Margaret Qualley (“The Substance”), among others, might squeeze onto the list.

But if any of those inarguable talents is feeling the sting of omission, know that you’re still good enough.

Just listen to this abbreviated list of lu­ minous actors whose names have never been uttered as part of the early­morning roll call: Meg Ryan, Marilyn Monroe, Hugh Grant, Glenn Ford, Donald Sutherland …

Donald Sutherland!?! Yes, the actor whose career spanned some six decades and included such titles as “MASH,” “Don’t Look Now,” “Invasion of the Body Snatch­ ers” and “Pride & Prejudice” never walked the Oscar carpet as a nominee. Perhaps the biggest insult came in 1981 when “Or­ dinary People” picked up nominations for best picture (winner), director (Robert Redford, winner), actress (Mary Tyler Moore) and supporting actor (Timothy Hutton, winner). Even Judd Hirsch was nominated for supporting actor. But no Sutherland, arguably the heart of the film.

The academy did try to make amends, handing Sutherland an honorary Oscar in 2017. But those “thanks for playing” tro­ phies don’t count — outright nominations in competitive acting races only, please.

How could Ryan be overlooked for “When Harry Met Sally”? Bruce Willis for

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“The Sixth Sense”? Jeff Daniels for “Terms of Endearment” or “The Purple Rose of Cairo”? Mel Gibson for “Braveheart” or “The Year of Living Dangerously”? Even Jennifer Lopez for “Selena” or “Hustlers”?

If nominated, Ryan would have been up against the winning Jessica Tandy for “Driving Miss Daisy.” Other nominees that year were Pauline Collins (“Shirley Valentine”), Isabelle Adjani (“Camille Claudel”), Michelle Pfeiffer (“The Fabu­ lous Baker Boys”) and Jessica Lange (“The Music Box”) — all wonderful perform­ ances. But 35 years later, which role still resonates in popular culture (“I’ll have what she’s having”)?

Not that the Oscars should be a popu­ larity contest, though it sometimes feels that way.

And if it were, surely Monroe, one of the reigning queens of 1950s Hollywood, would have been tapped for any number of performances that have been elevated by time and reappraisal. Besides her obvi­ ous iconic comedy roles in “Some Like It Hot” and “The Seven Year Itch,” even more dramatic turns in “Bus Stop” and “The Misfits” might have garnered notice from a more attentive academy. And vot­ ers did choose to give nods to her male co­stars in “Hot” (Jack Lemmon) and “Bus” (Don Murray).

Then there are those whose mere pres­ ence can lift the material to award­worthy regard. Peter Sarsgaard, Catherine O’Hara, Alfred Molina, Kevin Bacon, Thandiwe Newton, Mia Farrow, Parker Posey, Ewan McGregor … nope, not a sin­ gle nomination here.

If you expand the conversation to those who have been nominated but never sealed the deal with Oscar, the oversight can be even more startling.

This includes the obvious — eight­time bridesmaid Glenn Close, the “Susan Lucci of the Oscars” — as well as Golden Age legends — Cary Grant, Greta Garbo, Bar­ bara Stanwyck, Charlie Chaplin, etc. The list of the robbed goes on. Later matinee idols (and talented actors) who ended ca­ reers empty­handed run the gamut from Doris Day (the top box­office star in 1960, ’62, ’63 and ’64), Deborah Kerr and Lau­ ren Bacall to Richard Burton, Robert Mitchum and Montgomery Clift.

Sometimes it’s a simple matter of bad timing. In his first outing, eventual eight­ time nominee Peter O’Toole saw his tow­ ering “Lawrence of Arabia” performance go up against Gregory Peck’s beloved At­ ticus Finch in “To Kill a Mockingbird.” It was Peck’s fifth and final nomination, and he landed the prize. O’Toole never did.

All film buffs have personal favorites they think have been shamefully ignored.

In my mind are three exquisite actresses who danced with Oscar multiple times without taking the gold man home: Jane Alexander, Joan Allen and the late, incom­ parable Gena Rowlands.

Between 1971 and 1984, Alexander was nominated four times; her performances in “All the President’s Men” and “Kramer vs. Kramer” remain master classes today.

Allen had a creative burst from 1996 to 2001 with three noms (“Nixon,” “The Cru­ cible,” “The Contender”). Shockingly, Row­ lands was nominated only twice, for “A Woman Under the Influence” and “Gloria.”

The academy tried to atone in 2015 with an honorary trophy. You know where we stand on that.

Some previous nominees whose ab­ sence from the winner’s circle could (and should) be rectified when that next, hope­ fully great role comes along: Annette Be­

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1 Jennifer Lopez in the dream sequence from “Selena.”

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3 Donald Sutherland and Mary Tyler Moore in “Ordi­ nary People.”

4 Haley Joel Osment, left, and Bruce Willis in “The Sixth Sense.”

2 Thelma Ritter, Clark Gable, and Marilyn Monroe in “The Misfits.”

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UNITED ARTISTS

C AS T LE ROC K E NT ERT AINMENT

ning (!), Sigourney Weaver, Samuel L. Jackson, Amy Adams, Michelle Williams, Debra Winger, Mark Ruffalo, Miranda Richardson, Jennifer Jason Leigh, John Tra­ volta, Naomi Watts, Laura Linney, Tom Cruise …

You read that right. One need only re­ watch Cruise’s “Born on the Fourth of July,” “Magnolia” and even “Tropic Thun­ der” to know he has the acting chops and

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deserves a walk to the podium (though in his case, it could be a high­speed run).

When Travolta got the first of his two nominations for “Saturday Night Fever,” his competition included Burton in “Equus,” on his seventh and final nomina­ tion. Both lost to Richard Dreyfuss in “The Goodbye Girl.” That same year, a little­ known actor drew critical notice for a small, raw performance in “Looking for Mr.

5 Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal in "When Harry Met Sally.”

6 Mel Gibson, center, in “Braveheart.”

Goodbar.” Richard Gere wasn’t nominated for that film, or for “Days of Heaven” or “An Officer and a Gentleman” or “Chi­ cago” or anything that followed.

So what can he and this season’s shut­ outs cull from all this?

Simple: The Oscars are a crapshoot.

Sometimes you win, more often you lose … and sometimes you don’t even get in the game.

W A R N E R B R OS . P I C T U R E S ; U NI T E D A R T I S TS ; PA R A M O UN T P I C T U R E S ; S P Y GL A S S E N TE R TA I NMENT ; C AS T LE ROC K E NT ERT AINMENT ; ANDREW C OOPER PARAMO U N T P I CT U RE S

The Spotlight A Deeper Dive

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The Spotlight Production Design

Story by Emily Zemler

Oz is a fantasy land, but ‘Wicked’s’ set design was grounded in reality Oscar winner Nathan Crowley took a practical approach to designing the musical’s magical world: ‘Why wouldn’t you do it for real if you could?’

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LTHOUGH “WICKED” exists in a fantastical world, Nathan Crowley wanted to make every set as real as possible.

The production de­ signer, who was nominated for an Oscar in 2021 for “Tenet,” prefers a practical ap­ proach — an idea he took to an extreme when creating the magical world of Oz. “I’m not interested in standing in front

of a blue screen with a digital design,” Crowley says, speaking over Zoom from London’s Pinewood Studios, where he is prepping “Avengers: Doomsday.” “I want to make things. I knew doing it all prac­ tically was going to be a big, big task. But that being said, I wouldn’t have missed a minute of it.”

Crowley previously designed sets for “The Greatest Showman” and “Wonka,” al­ though his background is more in action and sci­fi than musicals. But he says he enjoys the “world­building fantasy” of the genre and likes the challenge of working with filmmakers to create sets that are op­ timized for choreography and large musi­ cal numbers. While Crowley watched the stage production of “Wicked” several times in preparation, he took more of his visual inspiration from the 1939 classic “The Wizard of Oz.” “It’s two totally different formats,” Crowley says. “We are telling this alterna­ tive story to ‘The Wizard of Oz,’ and we have to be cinematic. I have to get the au­ dience to fall into the world of Oz and not question it. The stage show is really about story, story, story, rather than design el­ ements. I have to tell you that you’re in Oz, and you must never question it, and you must focus on Galinda and Elphaba and not the set. But you also have to allow the audience to be nostalgic, so I had to put in those memories from the stage show and ‘The Wizard of Oz.’ ” Crowley and his team had five months to prep the film, which shot its two parts at the same time. All of the sets, many of which involved massive backlot builds, were constructed simultaneously using nearly 1,000 construction workers. There were separate backlots for Munchkinland, Shiz University and Emerald City, as well as numerous interior set builds on sound­ stages. As the film opens on Munchkin­ land, the camera follows perfect rows of colorful tulips. Those could have been in­ serted digitally, but instead Crowley en­ listed Mark Eves, a farmer in Norfolk, Eng­ land, to plant 9 million tulip bulbs.

“I planted 500 acres of corn for ‘Inter­ stellar,’ ” Crowley says. “So I knew we could do it because I’ve done it before. And be­ fore VFX, that’s what you’d go and do. So why wouldn’t you do it for real if you could?”

Shiz University was the most compli­ cated set, in part because it was built against a water tank that was deep enough to wade in. In the film, students and visi­ tors arrive to the school by boat, evoking the canals of Venice. The look of the uni­ versity is an amalgam of Italian, Moorish and American architectural styles, blend­ ing materials such as plaster, copper and wood.

“It’s a mixing of every culture,” Crowley says. “Architects would hate me. It’s com­

Giles Keyte NBCUniversal

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1 Millions of tulips were planted for Munchkin­ land scenes.

2 Nathan Crowley oversaw all the set designs on “Wicked.”

3 One puppeteer controlled the Wizard’s me­ chanical head.

forting, and it had to feel beautiful. The water did a lot of the work. It became very complex. By the time you hit the court­ yard, which is up the stairs from the water entrance, you’re 12 or 13 feet up before you can start building the actual university. It ended up going 55 feet high with a wind­ resistant structure.”

Inside Shiz, viewers get to glimpse the dorm rooms, several classrooms and a very whimsical library. It was important to Crowley that everything was as detailed as possible. The dorm room shared by El­ phaba and Galinda has curved walls with romantic windows, and hand­painted flowers adorn the woodwork and cabinets throughout the school.

The library set, used to introduce Fiyero in the song “Dancing Through Life,” exem­ plifies Crowley’s practical approach. The production designer collaborated with special effects supervisor Paul Corbould to design and construct three circular, motorized bookcases with internal ladders that could spin while actors danced inside.

“It was very tough to figure out a dance number with them,” Crowley says. “But for me, it was about the introduction of Fiyero.

He has to be the coolest guy in town, so the fact that he gets the coolest automated set was important. It was actually one of the first sets we built, but we didn’t shoot it un­

GILES KEYTE NBCUNIVERSAL

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The Spotlight Production Design

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til midschedule, so it was sitting there get­ ting tested and getting worked on and get­ ting practiced on for weeks.”

Another complicated set was Emerald City, an expansive backlot build that stood 52 feet high and used CGI extension to complete its sparkling grandeur. For Crowley, it was one of the most difficult to design, largely because filmgoing audi­ ences are so familiar with its silhouette.

“You always see it from afar, and I wanted to bridge the line between the dis­ tance shot and then moving into it,” he

4 The sleek Emer­ ald City Express train weighed in at 58 tons.

notes. “I wanted to finally connect the au­ dience from the 1939 film, which had [the city] as a painted backdrop. It had to be the most incredible place you could ever go to. It’s like what the White City [World’s Fair] must have been in Chicago, this dream. Shiz is founded in our reality; Munchkinland is slightly less but it’s something you’re familiar with; but Emer­ ald City had to be something new.”

Inside Emerald City, one of the most impressive details is the Wizard’s puppet­ eered mechanical head, which he uses to

speak to his subjects from behind the cur­ tain. The team constructed a working head for the Wizard’s throne room that was entirely practical.

“I’m most proud of the Wizard and the Emerald City Express train,” Crowley says.

“I loved being on set and seeing this giant head open and talk to you. All of the move­ ment was done by one puppeteer, and there were hydraulics controlled by spe­ cial effects because it had to be able to tilt.

It was so much fun. [This film] was really about the joy of making stuff.”

GILES KEYTE N BCUniv ersal

6 The library set had motorized bookcases that spun as actors danced in them.

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N B CU NI V E R S A L

5 Galinda’s ar­ rival by boat to Shiz University was inspired by Venice’s canals.

The Spotlight Who’s Counting

Story by Carla Meyer ■ Illustration by Natalia Agatte For The Times

Will he be anointed?

Ralph Fiennes has been a revered actor for decades yet has received comparatively scant academy recognition through the years. His lead actor nomination for his performance as a cardinal overseeing the selection of the next pope in “Conclave” is a big step in the right direction.

2

Fiennes earned two previous Oscar nominations: support­ ing, for his blandly evil com­ mandant in “Schindler’s List” (1993), and lead, for the love­ sick cartographer in “The English Patient” (1996).

7, 9

“Schindler’s” and “Patient” each won multiple Oscars, including best picture, but Fiennes lost to Tommy Lee Jones (“The Fugitive”) and Geoffrey Rush (“Shine”).

10+

Fiennes has received BAFTA, Screen Actors Guild, Emmy, Golden Globes and other nominations in the ...

21st century But the gap between his “Patient” and “Conclave” Oscar noms lasted roughly ...

1

full Timothée Chalamet. Or ...

28 years

Even though Fiennes won rave reviews in “The Con­ stant Gardener” (2005) and “The Grand Budapest Hotel” (2014). We have a theory ...

2005

... that academy voters took the whole “he who must not be named” thing from Fiennes’ first “Harry Potter” appearance too far, but ...

3

... maybe playing a man of the cloth offset that evil ener­ gy. Spencer Tracy, “Boys Town,” and Bing Crosby and Barry Fitzgerald, “Going My Way,” won playing priests.

2009

Did Philip Seymour Hoff­ man’s supporting nod as an enigmatic priest in “Doubt” lead the way for Fiennes’ questioning cardinal?

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The Spotlight Gold Standard

Best picture race is wide open. Here’s a suggested pitch for each contender With the focus on winning — even if it is an honor just to be nominated — it’s time to recalibrate those talking points and focus on the movie’s strengths

WHAT MOVIE WILL WIN THE OSCAR FOR BEST

‘A COMPLETE UNKNOWN’

picture? The race, for the moment, is more of a free­for­all than it has been in years.

For the 10 movies nominated, being invited to the party was just the first step. Now the focus is on winning. Talking points need to be refreshed and recalibrated. Existential crises about the meaning of it all must be kicked to the curb. The Oscars’ biggest prize is there for the taking! ¶ What mes­ sages might these 10 movies be sending as we head into the final stretch? Let’s open the envelopes and take a look.

[Sung to the tune of “Like a Rolling Stone”] Once upon a time, you voted so fine Gave Oscars to guys like Spielberg in his prime, didn’t you?

Now people vote “Everything Everywhere All at Once” You thought they were kidding you You used to brag about All the classic movies critics would tout Now you don’t talk so loud Now you don’t seem so proud About having to stream your next film How does it feel? How does it feel?

To be out on your own Voting for ‘A Complete Unknown’

Glenn Whipp Columnist

‘CONCLAVE’ ‘ANORA’ Over 230 Top 10 lists! We know what you’re thinking. There are 230 film critics still holding jobs? Yes, even if we had to stretch the definition to include members of the Critics Choice Assn. But the point is, people who love movies love this movie!

Why wouldn’t they? It’s like three classic films in one — screwball comedy, home­ invasion thriller and a rueful drama of re­ gret. Plus, there’s romance! And sex! And a soulful Russian dude. And Mikey Madison giving the best lead performance of the year. All seamlessly woven together by a true auteur, Sean Baker. It’s a f— miracle.

(Excuse the language. But we’re all grown­ ups, aren’t we?)

‘THE BRUTALIST’

Illustration by Susana Sanchez

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Creating art is hard. It’s the destination, not the journey because, again, creating art is a pitiless process that will grind you down. That finance guy who wonders why your movie has to be 3 ½ hours long?

Everything that is ugly, cruel and stupid — but mostly ugly — is his fault. Him and all the other dilettantes who don’t know the wonders of VistaVision. Rivers of frivolities may flow (ahem, “Emilia Pérez”), but this movie is designed to endure the cultural erosion inflicted by such trivialities. We hope you have found this conversation persuasive and intellectually stimulating.

You like us. You really, really like us. OK, maybe that’s overstating things a bit. You like us well enough. More importantly, you don’t hate us. Maybe we’re not your favorite film. But how about putting us No. 2 on your preferential ballot? As you know from watching our entertaining, enjoyable movie, you never know how an election might go.

‘DUNE: PART TWO’ We’re trying to be magnanimous here and express our appreciation for this best pic­ ture nomination and the four others you gave us. Thank you! But seriously ... what the hell? We won six Oscars for the first movie, and this one’s even better. Did you forget that it came out this year? Are your brains that riddled with age and decay?

Sorry. That was a little out of line. Anyway, again, thank you. We’re not expecting much ... now. But when the third movie comes out next year (and it will be arriving in December, so you won’t have that “It came out too early” excuse), you better make it up to us. Snub Denis Villeneuve again and we’re spiking your popcorn with psychedelic dust.

‘EMILIA PÉREZ’ You don’t go on Reddit, do you? Good.

What about Letterboxd? No? Glad to hear.

In fact, you might just want to stay off the internet until after the Oscars. There’s a lot of misinformation out there. Just dwell on the fact that “Emilia Pérez” received 13 Os­

FO C U S F E A T U R E S ; N E ON ; U NI V ER SA L P I C T U R E S ; S E A R C H L I G H T P IC TU R E S ; P A TH É F IL M S / F RANC E 2 C INEMA; A2 4 ; ORION PIC T URE S ; W ARNE R B ROS . PIC T URES ; S O N Y P I CT U RE S CLAS S I CS

car nominations, more than any other mov­ ie, and was recognized by writers, directors, actors, musicians ... we could go on, but you get the picture. People who know about the craft of cinema have consistently re­ warded this movie’s brilliance and audac­ ity. Remember that. Oh, and don’t go on TikTok, either. That place is a cesspool too.

‘I’M STILL HERE’ Look, we’re as surprised as anyone that we’re here. Thanks, again! We know it’s a bit of stretch to think we’ll win best pic­ ture, but please remember that we also earned nominations for lead actress (Golden Globe winner Fernanda Torres!) and international feature, where we’re up against that other movie that the internet (and Mexico) hates. We’re viable options in those categories — principled alterna­ tives, if you will.

‘NICKEL BOYS’ The best movie of the year? Don’t take our word for it. That august body of cineastes, the National Society of Film Critics, said so, and, frankly, it wasn’t even close. But back to the Oscars. It’s an honor to be nominated and all, but we’re thinking there’s room to grow, as we suspect some of you haven’t quite gotten around to see­ ing the movie yet. Maybe you’ve read the book and consider it a masterpiece. The movie is too, in a wholly original way.

‘THE SUBSTANCE’

↑ The best picture contend­ ers are: top row, “Conclave,” “Anora,” “Wicked”; second row, “A Complete Unknown,” “Emilia Pérez,” “The Brutal­ ist”; third row, “The Sub­ stance,” “Nickel Boys,” “Dune: Part Two”; bottom row, “I'm Still Here.”

Was that you leaving the theater with about 20 minutes to go in the film? No judgment. Even we realize that ending was a bit much, though purely by design. You see, it’s hard out there for women of a cer­ tain age. But you know that. Or you know somebody who knows that. Our lead, Demi Moore, definitely understands. Did you hear her speech at the Golden Globes after she won? What a night! Wouldn’t it be nice to keep the celebration going?

‘WICKED’ Why not vote for the musical that you saw in a movie theater (perhaps more than once), the one that has songs that are, you know, actually good?

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Hilary Swank wins the title for knockout ‘Million’ role

The Spotlight 20 Years Back ■ Story by Randee Dawn

EVEN WHEN AN OSCAR MOMENT IS MEANT TO FOCUS ON THE BEST ACTRESSES IN THE BUSINESS...

it often becomes about the actors. ¶ Early in the opening monologue for the 77th Acade­ my Awards, held at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood on Feb. 27, 2005, host Chris Rock struck a chord with at least a few actors in the audience. He compared Tom Cruise with Jude Law and then asked, “Who is Jude Law? Why is he in every movie I have seen in the last four years? … He’s in everything.” ¶ It was a callout that much later in the show Sean Penn, who was onstage to read out the nominees for lead actress, decided to address. Going off­ script, Penn said, “Forgive my compromised sense of humor, but I did want to answer [Rock’s] question about who Jude Law is. He’s one of our finest actors.” Only then did he pivot to focus on the women: “What Jude and all talented actors know is that for every greatly talented actor, there are five actresses who are nothing short of magic. And the Academy’s favorite five this year are…” ¶ After that segue, it was time for a small bit of his­ tory to be made, when Hilary Swank earned her second Oscar.

20 05 REVISITING KEY OSCAR MOMENTS FROM TWO DECADES AGO

M A R K J . T E R R IL L A S S OC IA TE D PR E S S

CATEGORY: Lead Actress

SHE HITS, SHE SCORES

A FAMILIAR PAIRING

By winning that award, Swank became the first woman in academy history to win for playing a boxer, in “Million Dollar Baby.” (She’d already become the first nominated.) After giving husband Chad Lowe a hug in the audience (they would divorce two years later), Swank took the stage to accept the award. It was her second win on her second nomination; she’d won her first Oscar in 2000 for “Boys Don’t Cry.” “I don’t know what I did in this life to deserve all this,” she said in her Nebraska twang. “I’m just a girl from a trailer park who had a dream.”

She gave Lowe thanks, calling him “my everything,” and made sure to thank the cast and crew from “Million,” which had already earned co­star Morgan Freeman an Oscar for his role in the film and would shortly thereafter earn director­producer Clint Eastwood two more Oscars (for di­ recting and best picture). Swank also thanked her mother “for believing in me from the beginning; my dad for support,” then saved special thoughts for Eastwood, calling him her “mo chuisle,” an Irish phrase meaning “pulse of my heart” that was used in the film.

Surely, Annette Bening, who also was nominated in the category for playing an actor in “Being Julia,” was having déjà vu.

She and Swank had been opposite one another on the lead actress nominee list in 2000. At that time, Bening was up for “American Beauty,” and Swank won it then too, for “Boys Don’t Cry.” Bening has been nominated five times for an Oscar (1991, 2000, 2005, 2011, 2024) with no wins; all of them were leading nominations except one in the supporting category.

“I would think it would feel really great [to win], but I certainly know what it’s like not to win,” she told Rolling Stone ahead of the 2024 Oscars ceremony, when she was up for “Nyad.” “I’ve been there and I’ve done that, and that’s also not so bad.”

Also up for the award were first­time nominee Catalina Sandino Moreno, who played a drug mule in “Maria Full of Grace”; fellow first­timer Imelda Staunton, who played the title character, an abortion provider, in “Vera Drake”; and Kate Winslet, for playing a woman who’s had her memories erased in “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.” Winslet is a seven­ time nominee (1996, 1998, 2002, 2005, 2007, 2009 and 2016), which includes her one win in the category in 2009 for “The Reader.” Winslet missed a nomination this year for her biopic “Lee,” based on Ameri­ can photographer Lee Miller.

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← Hilary Swank took home the lead actress Oscar in 2005 for her turn as a boxer in “Million Dollar Baby.”

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Box Office Rewind p 42

Illustration

by Nicole Vas

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THE WIDE SHOT: Specializing in indie films pays for Focus Features p 40

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The Industry The Wide Shot

Sharply focused on moviegoers’ tastes How Focus Features tapped into audiences beyond the art house with such recent crowd-pleasing films as ‘Conclave’ and ‘Nosferatu’

Ryan Faughnder Senior Editor

business these days. But Focus Features, the prestige­minded unit of Comcast’s Universal Filmed Entertainment Group, has been enjoying a strong run lately.

Its politicking papal succession drama “Conclave,” starring Ralph Fiennes and directed by Edward Berger, has grossed $69 million in global ticket sales, includ­ ing $31.5 million domestically (Focus ac­ quired the U.S. rights in 2023). The movie got seven Oscar nominations, including best picture as well as lead actor Fiennes, supporting actress Isabella Rossellini and adapted screenplay. “Nosferatu,” a gothic vampire picture from Robert Eggers, has collected $136 million in worldwide re­ ceipts since its Christmas Day debut and received four Oscar nominations.

Not bad, particularly at a time when the box office is dominated by action franchises and kids movies, and when theatrical windows are much shorter than they were before the COVID­19 pandemic, especially for smaller films like the adult­oriented dramas, comedies and festival picks that Focus pursues.

At the Sundance Film Festival, the com­ pany debuted “The Ballad of Wallis Island,” starring Carey Mulligan. Other upcoming releases include Steven Soderbergh’s “Black Bag” and “Downton Abbey 3.”

You’ve said that the specialty film business was potentially poised for another golden age, which is a counterintuitive take. Why? It’s more broad than just what I think is a positive moment for specialty film but also for film in general.

If you look at the landscape right now, in terms of what audiences seem to be coming to theaters for, and taking owner­ ship of and amplifying through their own lives, more and more you’re seeing that they are the bold swings, the ones that feel like they are coming from unique, vision­ ary points of view.

It’s great for audiences and the film busi­ ness as a whole in terms of building a future for new filmmakers and new voices. And for the specialty sector, it’s great because that’s what we’ve been doing all along.

When you say fans and audiences are taking ownership of films, what do you mean? Are we talking about Let­

terboxd? Social media?

That’s certainly a big part of it. I think Letterboxd specifically has been a great thing for films and for audiences.

A film like “Conclave,” by traditional metrics several years ago, would have been considered squarely a classical piece of prestige filmmaking for an older audi­ ence. And that’s a big part of its success.

But also a big part of it has been young­ er audiences showing up and amplifying it through a take on social media, whether it’s the “Mean Girls” memes or using the shot of the cardinal taking the hit off the vape pen. The fact that audiences are con­ necting to that aspect and the joyousness, entertainment value and humor of that movie is kind of new for a film like that.

You also see it happening with “Nosfer­ atu” — people owning that by responding to the sarcophagi that we’ve got in movie theaters and being like, “In December, my whole personality is going to be ‘Nosfer­ atu.’ ” For hyper intellectual­property­ based films, that has been happening for a while. But certainly for a film like “Nosfer­ atu,” there’s just a fresh energy.

Some of that stuff you can lean into and facilitate through market­ ing, right?

“Facilitate” is a good word for it, because you definitely can’t create that energy.

You can try all you want to create it, but all you can do is provide the tools for that en­ ergy to harness.

It’s not unheard of to release a big horror movie on Christmas, but it’s still perhaps unexpected. What was the thinking behind that decision?

You’re right that it’s not unheard of.

Maybe most famously: Dec. 26, 1973, “The Exorcist” comes out. There’s no bet­ ter example. And I actually think that’s not a coincidence.

When we announced the date, there was a lot of discussion online about, “It should be Halloween. What are you guys thinking?” Trust me, I love going to the movies and watching a certain kind of hor­ ror film in October. But also, there’s a rea­ son that every major culture and religion in the world has a festival of lights of some

→ Willem Dafoe stars in Robert Eggers’ remake of “Nosferatu,” a hit for indie distributor Focus Features.

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I recently caught up with Peter Ku­ jawski, who has served as chairman of Fo­ cus since 2016, to discuss the state of the indie film business and other hot topics in the sector. This interview, which took place before the release of “Nosferatu,” has been edited for length and clarity.

latimes.com/theenvelope

FOC U S F E A T UR E S

IT’S NOT EASY TO BE IN THE SPECIALTY FILM

sort around the winter solstice. That’s be­ cause, deep in the DNA of who we are, we’re most afraid when it’s most dark.

That’s actually what Rob [Eggers] is do­ ing with this film. He’s not creating panic with jump scares and things like that. The movie delivers those. But what Rob is so good at is fear. That real languishing sense of dread over a whole movie.

FOC U S F E A TU R ES

Are older moviegoers coming back to theaters? That’s the sweet spot for a movie like “Conclave.”

There’s no doubt that that particular seg­ ment of the audience has been the slow­ est in coming back. But for sure, “Con­ clave” has a core older audience that really came out for that movie. And I think that’s a stepping stone. We are one of the com­ panies providing films for this audience and doing it with regular cadence. And I think it’s even more important that the regular cadence remain there so that the habit of moviegoing can continue.

I want to give a shoutout to a movie that we weren’t involved in that did a bril­ liant job of it. Look at the audience for “Thelma.” It’s not obvious that that film would do the box office that it did [$12.5 million worldwide], but I think it did be­ cause the movie was brilliant, funny and heartfelt and also gave something to an audience that is largely underserved.

You’re under the Universal film um­ brella, which means your titles are released in theaters first and then come out on premium video on­de­ mand just a few weeks later. Is that strategy working?

We have seen it do a couple things right from the get­go. One, it really does work.

It absolutely drives quite significant incre­ mental revenue to the movie. Trust me, no one has been more vocal internally about advocating for the stress­testing of the idea. We’ve looked at it over and over again and literally have reams of backup data showing that the audiences engaging with the film on PVOD are not cannibaliz­ ing the audiences that engage theatrically.

Do you feel like you’ve come up with the right mix of movies? How do you

think about building out your slate?

We try to be smart about the balance in terms of the size of our swings. But the ethos behind all of them is really the same.

We want every movie we make to be un­ mistakably unique and impossible to con­ ceive of as a work by any other filmmaker.

On that level, I think we’re absolutely hit­ ting that mark.

You’ve done thought­provoking polit­ ical movies, like “On the Basis of Sex” and “BlacKkKlansman.” Right now, studios seem nervous to touch hot­ button political issues in filmmaking. Do

↑ Carey Mulli­ gan and Tom Basden star in James Griffiths' “The Ballad of Wallis Island,” premiering at Sundance.

Director Steven Soderbergh’s “Black Bag,” starring Michael Fassbender, is upcoming from Focus Features.

you see that chilling effect happening?

It’s sort of the story of the day. If some­ thing comes across our desk that we love and are responding to, of course we would jump to do that again, and I believe we would be given all the support we’ve al­ ways been given.

You want to be smart and careful that you are telling the story for the right rea­ sons, and that you’re telling the story in a way that is still grounded in an authentic human experience. Rather than trying to create a film that is built to be a piece of politics, which, historically, if you go too far in that direction, can often backfire.

latimes.com/theenvelope

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The Industry Box Office Rewind

The long view: Supersized contenders don’t always rule at the Oscars Running almost as long as ‘Gone With the Wind,’ ‘The Brutalist’ lags at the box office.

But ‘Wicked’ and ‘Dune: Part Two’ have done big business. Is less more?

I

F “THE BRUTALIST” WINS THE COVETED BEST PICTURE

Oscar, it will be one of the longest films to ever do so, although its box­office take is lagging considerably behind many previous recipients. “Gone With the Wind,” which runs nearly four hours with intermission, is the longest winner and has grossed $402.4 million worldwide since its 1939 release, according to BoxOfficeMojo. ¶ By com­ parison, “The Brutalist” spans three hours and 35 minutes with a 15­minute intermission and had mustered $11.7 million world­ wide in limited release as of Jan. 31; that tally is expected to

climb now that the film has received 10 Academy Award nomina­ tions. ¶ It is not the only supersized movie vying for the top tro­ phy: “Wicked” and “Dune: Part Two” both exceed the 2½­hour mark, and while each has rung up more than $710 million in global ticket sales, neither ranks among the Top 10 grossing films with that lengthy running time or beyond. ¶ Even last sea­ son’s “Oppenheimer,” which had a run time of three hours, fails to make the cut with a worldwide gross of $975.6 million. But weep not for Christopher Nolan: He won two Oscars for his film, including the best picture statuette.

$2.9B $4.3B

2009 “AVATAR” 2 HOURS, 42 MINUTES $2.8B $3.4B

2019 “AVENGERS: ENDGAME” 3 HOURS, 1 MINUTE $2.3B $3.5B

2022 “AVATAR: THE WAY OF WATER” 3 HOURS, 12 MINUTES

$2.3B $4.4B

1997 “TITANIC” 3 HOURS, 14 MINUTES 2017 “STAR WARS: EPISODE VIII — THE LAST JEDI” 2 HOURS, 32 MINUTES

$1.3B $1.7B

2003 “THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING” 3 HOURS, 21 MINUTES

KEY ■ Worldwide gross ■ Adjusted for inflation

Grosses from Boxofficemojo.com.

Figures adjusted for inflation using U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI Inflation Calculator.

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$1.1B $2B

2011 “TRANSFORMERS: DARK OF THE MOON” 2 HOURS, 34 MINUTES

$1.1B $1.6B

2012 “THE DARK KNIGHT RISES” 2 HOURS, 44 MINUTES

$1.1B $1.5B

2014 “TRANSFORMERS: AGE OF EXTINCTION” 2 HOURS, 45 MINUTES

$1.1B $1.5B

2006 “PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN’S CHEST” 2 HOURS, 31 MINUTES

$1.1B $1.7B Numbers in billions

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$1

$2

$3

$4

$5

W E TA ; M A R V E L S T U DI O S; 20 T H C E N T UR Y S T U DI O S; P A R A M OU N T P I CT UR E S ; LU C A S F IL M L TD. ; NEW LINE PRODUC T IONS ; P A R A M O UN T P I C T U R E S ; WA R N E R B R OS . P I C T U R E S ; P A R A M OU NT P IC T UR E S ; D IS NE Y E N TE RPRIS ES

Story by Diane Garrett

Performers February 4, 2025

FO C U S F E A T U R E S

Story by Daron James

One Shot In Edward Berger’s suspenseful “Conclave,” a spirited monologue from newcomer Cardinal Benitez (Carlos Diehz) speaks of the pettiness among the clergymen gathered to select the next pontiff.

“These things are not the church,” he says of their quarrels. “The church is not a tradition. The church is not the past. The church is what we do next.” The fiery message urges solidarity among the dis­ tracted conclave of cardinals, and in the ensuing scene they walk as one toward the Sistine Chapel through the rain holding white umbrellas. Berger suggests the angelic visual, framed from high above, is a metaphor for the cardinals to “find purity, the reason why they started in the first place with this job.” The allegorical imagery partly found its allure from costume designer Lisy Christl. Typi­ cally one imagines black when thinking of an umbrella, Berger says. “And she showed me this white one and I thought, ‘That’s genius.’ ” But even with the reinvigorated faith among the Church of the Cardinals, the portrait subliminally hints at the emotional undertone of the protagonist, Berger says.

“You may notice there’s one guy without an umbrella. He’s broken. He doesn’t get one.”

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