By Eleanor Ringel Cater
As the sun slowly sets on the summer of Barbenheimer, awards season shimmers in a not-so-distant future.
And at this point, the race for Best Supporting Actor could come down to a pair of MVP performances in both pictures.
Ryan Gosling and Robert Downey Jr., c’mon down (yes, I tip my hat to “Price Is Right” host and ardent animal rights activist, the recently deceased Bob Barker).
The former, of course, is all fun-‘n’-games in his gloriously comedic performance as “just Ken” in “Barbie,” while the latter is all grim gamesmanship as the manipulative Lewis Strauss in “Oppenheimer.”
Both are flat-out brilliant. Both have been Oscar-nominated twice, Downey for 1992’s “Chaplin” and 2008’s “Tropic Thunder” and Gosling for 2006’s “Half Nelson” and 2016’s “La La Land.”
But who has the edge? At this point, I’d say Downey. For several reasons. First, he almost singlehandedly saved Hollywood’s bottom line by creating Tony Stark. aka, Iron Man, on whose mighty (albeit snarky) shoulders the Marvel Cinematic Universe rests.
Second, while it’s not entirely true that Oscar hates great comic performances, there is a certain self-seriousness about the Academy that doesn’t always bode well for being funny.
But not necessarily. Last year’s best supporting winners, Jamie Lee Curtis and Ke Huy Quan, were borderline farcical in “Everything Everywhere All at Once.” And the movie’s star Michelle Yeoh, named Best Actress, was pretty funny, too.
In fact, the list of Oscar winners who made us laugh is actually pretty long, ranging from flat-out hilarious – Alan Arkin in “Little Miss Sunshine,” Martin Landau in “Ed Wood,” Kevin Kline in “A Fish Called Wanda” – to more romantic-comedy funny: Diane Keaton in “Annie Hall,” Cher in “Moonstruck,” Jack Nicholson in “As Good As It Gets.” Oscar also likes it when typically “dramatic” actors clown around. Think Sir John Gielgud in “Arthur” or Jack Palance in “City Slickers.”
Still, the year is far from over. We’re already hearing buzz about Robert De Niro, reunited with Martin Scorsese for “Killers of the Flower Moon.” Matt Damon, who plays J. Robert Oppenheimer’s foursquare military wrangler (so to speak), might have a chance; he’d have a better chance if it weren’t for Downey.
The early line in the venerable trade paper Variety also names Charles Melton in “May December,” based on the true-life story of a 7th-grader who had an affair and, later, a happy marriage with his 30-something teacher, and John Magaro in “Past Lives” as one of two South Korean best pals who are reunited decades later in New York.
A final possibility is that the immensely popular Downey and Gosling cancel each other out, meaning….De Niro? Changes have been made, but the Academy membership still skews older, whiter and, well, male-er. If De Niro can have his seventh baby at 79, why not his third Oscar?
I am so glad you came back to writing after a brief interlude.