Will there be room for two Oscar winners for the same film this awards season?
Pedro Almodóvar's melodrama thriller “The Room Next Door” is enjoying a huge buzz after winning the prestigious Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, and Sony Pictures Classics is gearing up for an aggressive awards campaign for the film. diverse The Guardian has exclusively learned that the film’s Oscar-winning stars Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton are up for the lead roles this coming awards season, while co-star John Turturro is set to campaign for his first Oscar in the Best Supporting Actor category.
Adapted from Sigrid Nunez's novel What Are You Doing?, the film tells the story of two women—war correspondent Martha, played by Swinton, and author Ingrid, played by Moore—who meet after many years under emotionally charged circumstances. The nuanced performances and intimate narrative have been critically acclaimed. Varieties “The Room Next Door, powered by Swinton's moving, humane performance, lifts you up and delivers a cathartic psychological thrill,” writes chief film critic Owen Gleiberman.
ReadsYou can see all the Oscar predictions in all 23 categories on one page at: diverse Awards Circle: Oscars
Moore is an Academy Award favorite, having won Best Actress for her role in the Alzheimer's film Still Alice (2014), another Sony Pictures Classics project. She has also been nominated for four other awards for her roles in Boogie Nights (1997), The End of the Affair (1999), The Hours (2002) and Far From Heaven (2002). Swinton, who won Best Supporting Actress for her role in Michael Clayton (2007), has not returned to the nominations circle since, despite acclaimed performances in such films as We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011).
In recent years, it has become rare for two prominent stars from the same film to compete in the same lead category due to what is informally known as “category fraud” — when an actor competes in a supporting role despite what many consider to be the lead role. Some notable examples include Brad Pitt winning in the supporting actor category for Once Upon a Time in…Hollywood (2019), where his co-star Leonardo DiCaprio was only competing in the lead role, and Rooney Mara’s supporting actress nomination for the romantic drama Carol (2015), despite receiving more screen time than lead actress nominee Cate Blanchett.
While Moore and Swinton’s screen time in “The Room Next Door” has yet to be officially tallied, early feedback suggests the two actresses share a fairly even distribution of narrative without overshadowing each other. Their decision to be nominated in the same category represents a refreshing embrace of artistic integrity over strategic positioning, and could make them stand out in a competitive awards season.
But history has shown that getting two Best Actress nominations for the same film is rare. Only five films have ever won: All About Eve (1950) with Anne Baxter and Bette Davis, Suddenly, Last Summer (1959) with Katharine Hepburn and Elizabeth Taylor, The Turning Point (1977) with Anne Bancroft and Shirley MacLaine, Terms of Endearment (1983) with Shirley MacLaine and Debra Winger, and Thelma & Louise (1991) with Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon. Of those, only MacLaine has won, for her role in Terms of Endearment.
Can Moore and Swinton break their 33-year drought and earn two Best Actress nominations?
It’s certainly possible, but pulling off such a strategy would require a nearly flawless campaign. This season’s best actress race is already shaping up to be a highly competitive one, with a mix of standout performers and industry veterans. Potential contenders include Carla Sofia Gascón (“Emilia Perez”), Angelina Jolie (“Maria”), Marianne Jean-Baptiste (“Hard Truths”), Nicole Kidman (“Baby Girl”), Mikey Madison (“Anora”) and Demi Moore (“The Subsistence”). Additionally, Sony Classics will need to balance its resources, as the studio is also backing other films with strong female leads, including Saoirse Ronan in the Sundance-winning drama “The Out Run” and Fernanda Torres in the critically acclaimed Brazilian political thriller “I’m Still Here.”
Produced by Esther García and Agustín Almodóvar, the film will compete in several categories, including Best Picture. If successful, it will be director Pedro Almodóvar's first film to be nominated for the top Oscar. Almodóvar has previously won Oscars for Best Original Screenplay for Talk to Her (2002) and Best International Feature Film for All About My Mother (1999), but somehow, he has never won Best Picture. That could all change this year.
Almodóvar could make history with The Room Next Door, and with strong performances from Moore and Swinton, his Oscar chances are already looking promising.
“The Room Next Door” will open in theaters in New York and Los Angeles on December 20, followed by a limited U.S. release on Christmas Day and a wide U.S. expansion in January 2025.
