Competition among costars at the Oscars used to be commonplace but has gotten rarer
“Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri” actors Sam Rockwell and Woody Harrelson are both up for the supporting Oscar. Although costars sharing categories was a nearly annual occurrence until the 1990s, it has happened less often since, and hardly ever with men.
6 — Years since Octavia Spencer and Jessica Chastain — the most recent nominees from the same film to vie in the same category — competed for the supporting actress statue for “The Help.” Spencer won.
26 — Years since male costars were in the same race. In 1992, supporting nominees Harvey Keitel and Ben Kingsley, from “Bugsy,” lost out to Jack Palance from “City Slickers.”
5 films have yielded three nominees in a single category. The most recent was 1974’s “The Godfather: Part II,” for which Robert De Niro, Michael V. Gazzo and Lee Strasberg were up for supporting awards.
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1 De Niro’s subsequent Oscar is the only one won by a 3-in-1 nominee.
22 total Academy Awards have resulted from 141 performances by nominees pitted against costars. This is worse than straight 1-out-of-5 odds and lends credence to the “split the vote” theory.
From the Oscars to the Emmys.
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