Just Give Ryan (Gosling) and Amy (Addams) Their Oscars Already!

If I were to pick our greatest current talents, arbitrarily ignoring our great talents of previous eras who are still alive and putting out great work, than I would have to say without a doubt in mind that I would choose Ryan Gosling and Amy Adams. And yet, neither have been given an Oscar to this day. We have talked about Oscar politics before on this blog and yet both of our candidates today have done great work that should and has fit many of the arbitrary categories in the very arbitrary world of the Oscars. Both have starred in biopics of well known and troubled figures, a usual sure fire hit with the academy, and both have been genuinely excellent in said films. So what’s happening here? The Oscars are simultaneously not a science in the slightest, whilst also being wholly based upon patterns and un-written rules. What makes Ryan and Amy so fascinating to me is that they oblige and fit so many of these Oscar laws and yet have still been snubbed year after year.

Credit

I pair them also for this essay because I do believe that they are both the finest talents we have working today, both excel in multiple genres, from the bleakest of human dramas to the broadest of comedies, and both exemplify "range" to a T. Let’s begin by zoning on Amy.

Credit

Amy is in a better shape it seems Oscar wise than Ryan, with 1 best actress nomination, but five best supporting actress nominations. Her first nomination was for the 2006 indie comedy; Junebug, which felt perfectly like the debut Oscar nomination of an actress who would later go on to sweep an award season. Her next nomination was for 2009’s Doubt. This is where the pattern begins. In-between Junebug and Doubt, Amy was the perfect live action princess in the nowadays underrated Disney film Enchanted, just oozing pure charisma, humour and elegance. Compare this then with her nominated performance in Doubt, as the meek and vulnerable Sister James going head to head with Meryl Streep and Phillip Seymour Hoffman and stealing certain scenes. No win. Lost to Penelope Cruz for Vicky Christina Barcelona, I feel the right choice was made here, albeit a tough one. Amy is certainly the runner up. In-between her next nomination, Amy appears in more standard fare, portraying multiple rom-com leading ladies in films that unfortunately don’t serve her very well and are mostly dull. Her next nomination is for her performance in The Fighter, another stellar performance exemplifying her range, a far cry from the meek Sister James, Amy’s Charlene is fierce in this film and serves it’s heart and centre. No win. Lost to her co-star Melissa Leo. Unfortunately for Amy, another correct choice. We are now entering a period of really superb work, alongside blockbuster supporting roles in pure DC trash. Albeit I will comment that her Lois Lane is one of the better things that her Superman movies have going for them. As Mary in The Muppets, she hits every musical and comedic note, but I don’t see a nomination for that. In 2012 we have our first travesty, although more will come. Amy loses to Sally Field for Lincoln, despite her Peggy Dodd in the blatantly Oscarless The Master being a performance of devious cunning elegance. The travesties now start coming thick and fast. Nominations for her work in Her and Big eyes would not have gone amiss, but a nomination was granted in this period for her performance in American Hustle, undoubtedly the best part of this messy film. A nomination was more than deserved and was received, but she was never going to win against Blanchett in Blue Jasmine and frankly nor should she have. Amy’s other nomination to date was for her roles as Lyn Cheney in Vice, a film that I thought that was superb all over, yet I felt was dismissed a little in the Oscar race, despite multiple nominations. Regina King won, but I’d pick Rachel Weisz in The Favourite before Amy, but Amy would be my second, Regina being my third.

Credit

 Amy’s biggest travesty however comes in 2016 with the absolute knockout back to back release of Arrival, where as Louise Banks she is dramatic, sensational and filled with great pathos, and Nocturnal Animals, where her cold nature gives the film more emotion than one could ever figure. NOT A SINGLE NOMINATION FOR EITHER! The common prevailing thought here is that she split her own vote, as is often the case with the Oscars, many are unwilling to nominate a single person for multiple categories and certainly not for multiple slots in the same category. As I feel was the case that hindered Amy here. In other years both performances could have easily won, but her talent undercut her and the incredible night at the cinema I had watching both films back-to-back led ultimately to an issue when it came to standardized voting.

Let’s move over to Ryan, shall we?

Credit

Ryan is in far worse shape Oscar wise than Amy is. With only two nominations to his name as of date, ten years between them, both for best actor; 2007’s Half Nelson and 2017’s La La land. Ryan has time and time again proved to us his supreme talent and yet Oscars, and even nominations most of the time, have eluded him. In The Notebook he added real human drama, along with Rachel McAdams to a rather soppy melodrama. Fracture he gave us a charisma tour de force as Willy Beachum, a put upon lawyer. In Lars and the Real Girl, he made us fall in love with an inanimate object more than some of his human love interests. In Blue Valentine he tore our hearts out quite simply. In Drive and All Good Things he gave us nothing but steel, but an entire world of emotion with just his eyes. Similarly in The Ides of March he perfectly encapsulated the put-upon ladder climber, and embodied the exact sort of powerful charisma that his co-star George Clooney has been perfecting for decades. But we now turn to the real travesties, all down to a simple choice of subtlety over loudness. Not that Ryan can’t do loudness and can’t do it brilliantly; The Nice Guys is a prime example of that. But there must be a reason why such excellent work as in First Man and Blade Runner 2049 keeps getting snubbed. Biggest travesty here in my eyes is First man as it was so painfully ripe for a nomination, but it was far too subtle, people need to scream and play alcoholics to get noticed. There’s just no two ways around it. This bias against subtle work has thwarted Ryan time and time again. What  I’m trying to illuminate here is that it’s truly astonishing that such an immense body of work can go so blissfully unacknowledged.

I think to conclude I must comment that I do believe that both Adams' and Gosling’s Oscars are in the mail and will be with them very shortly, however I had this same thought some five years ago, and some five years before that – so I can’t exactly pin down what project will lead to this victory for them. I must also make the almost obligatory comment about how the Oscars very well could mean absolutely nothing. The fact that neither have a gold statue will never take away from the immense love and critical devotion that the two have right now, and will most likely have in the future. I guess it’s just a personal gripe. Perhaps these two brilliant actors share this gripe or perhaps they see the award as being completely superfluous in the path of their careers.

-Thomas Carruthers