DiCaprio has Oscar glory in sight
Will it be an Irish night with Room sweeping the boards? And how about Star Wars: The Force Awakens, partially shot in Dingle?
There are more questions than answers ahead of tomorrow night’s Academy Awards but already the bookies are predicting DiCaprio will make it and that Ronan will miss out for the second time.
If DiCaprio fails to win an Oscar it will be five times unlucky but Peter O’Toole still holds the record. Irish hellraiser O’Toole was nominated no less than eight times. Another legendary Hollywood wild man, Richard Burton, had seven nominations, while Glenn Close was nominated six times without ever getting on stage to collect an Oscar.
Hollywood legend Deborah Kerr also had six unsuccessful nominations, along with another star of the 1950s, Thelma Ritter.
Matt Damon is nominated this year for The Martian and Mark Ruffalo for Spotlight. If they fail to win, it will be three losses each.
But it looks like DiCaprio will finally get the gong. According to BoyleSports, it’s expected to be a clean sweep for The Revenant.
Despite always being an odds-on shot, opening at 4/6, Leo is now red hot at 1/100 to finally get his hands on the Academy Award.
Irish support for Saoirse Ronan to claim best actress for her role in Brooklyn has dwindled as she drifts out to 9/1 from 8/1. It is Room’s Brie Larson who dominates the category and has most recently been cut to 1/20 from 1/16 for the award.
“With the voting closed, it looks like we are in for no surprises across the key categories,” said Boylesports’ Aoife Heffron.
“Leonardo DiCaprio is now as short as 1/100, leaving it more as a formality for him to be announced best actor.
“Saoirse Ronan has drifted for Best Actress as Brie Larson shortens into what appears to be an unbeatable price of 1/20 but, as a result of the strong Irish support we have seen in the run-up to the Academy Awards, should Saoirse steal the award from Brie, we are facing a hefty payout.”
The academy that votes for the Oscars has nominated all white actors for the second year in a row, prompting a public outcry, reforms to the membership of the voting body, and a focus on diversity the wider industry.
Star Wars director JJ Abrams, whose film The Force Awakens is nominated for five Oscars, said the conversation about diversity had to happen.
Arriving at the US-Ireland Alliance Oscar Wilde Awards on Thursday at his production company, Bad Robot, he said: “It is never a bad time to talk about being inclusive and the irony is it’s just good business.
“Everyone talks about it in this way like it’s this other thing, but it’s not going away and it’s smart.
“When you are inclusive and you have different voices other than the usual suspects you have better stories and more interesting stories, you get performances from people on camera and behind the camera.
“It almost feels ridiculous we are having a conversation about it, it should just be what it is. It’s happening, too slowly, but it’s happening.”
Abrams’ Star Wars film, which has made more than $2bn worldwide, features a black actor and a woman in its lead roles and the director added: “It didn’t seem to be a problem.”
The Force Awakens scored five nominations — for editing, visual effects, sound editing, sound mixing, and original score for composer John Williams — and Abrams said he would be rooting for his collaborators.
He added: “I am so proud of the work everyone on the crew did and we all felt like we were trying to serve something bigger than us, so to see people like the editors, the sound, the visual effects, John Williams, get nominated is really a thrill and very well deserved.”
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
