Lady Gaga earned two Oscar nominations for “A Star is Born” (2018): Best Actress and Best Original Song for “Shallow,” winning the latter. But now she could win Best Actress on her second try for really going off the deep end. She’s playing Harley Quinn in the upcoming “Joker: Folie à Deux,” the sequel to the Oscar-winning 2019 film that finally won top honors for leading man Joaquin Phoenix. Will Gaga now join him in the winner’s circle?
As of this writing, Gaga is a strong contender for a nomination at the very least, ranked fifth in our Best Actress odds based on the combined predictions of Gold Derby users who have placed their early bets here in our predictions center. What’s more, she’s predicted to win by two Expert journalists who we’ve surveyed from major media outlets (many more Experts will chime in with their forecasts in the coming weeks and months). And she’s backed for the win by three of our Top 24 Users who got the highest scores predicting last year’s Oscar noms.
Despite polarizing critics and audiences, the first “Joker” earned 11 Oscar noms including Best Picture and Best Director (Todd Phillips). That was an especially impressive feat given that Oscar voters have always been ambivalent about superhero movies. It’s even more remarkable then that Phoenix was actually the second actor to win an Oscar for playing the title supervillain, following Heath Ledger‘s posthumous victory for “The Dark Knight” (2008).
The character of Harley Quinn hasn’t had the same good fortune, though. The deranged villainess was played by Oscar nominee Margot Robbie in three films: “Suicide Squad” (2016), “Birds of Prey” (2020) and “The Suicide Squad” (2021). But those were treated like popcorn movies on the awards circuit, mostly receiving recognition at fan-voted events. The first “Suicide Squad” did win an Oscar for Best Makeup and Hairstyling, but otherwise didn’t have the prestige appeal that “Joker” ended up having.
“Folie à Deux” could change that, though. Todd Phillips is back in the director’s chair, and the film is already slated to compete at the upcoming Venice Film Festival, which runs from August 28 to September 7. We’ll get a better sense of its awards prospects then, but even if this “Joker” divides critics again, as we saw before that might not prevent the film from striking a chord with academy members. And after Gaga proved her acting chops in “A Star is Born,” voters might hand it to her this time if lightning strikes twice.
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