Philly + 2022 Oscar nominees = big wins! Questlove, Adam McKay, Will Smith could take home an Academy Award this year.
When February 9’s Oscar nominees were announced for the 2022 Academy Awards, and several Philadelphia names-above-the-titles were declared – Questlove, Adam McKay, Will Smith – there wasn’t so much surprise in the proclamation.
For months, we’ve known that first-time director Ahmir Questlove Thompson had fashioned a worthy vessel out of unused footage of 1969’s Harlem Cultural Festival to tell his documentary, Summer of Soul’s story. And that Big Willie had taken a different tact in telling the story of tennis’ Williams sisters by playing their father in King Richard. And that McKay, the king of black satirical comedy with social relevance, had made his maudlin, mirthful Don’t Look Up flick into something more powerful than imagined with every viewing.
We knew that these guys should have been nominated for Oscars. It was all but written in the cards. Or the stars. Or wherever people write these things.
This time, the big deal is that they can actually – and will probably – win.
Questlove’s fight against the erasing of Black culture that is Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised) a documentary also nominated for a 2022 Grammy Award in April for best music film, is – dare I say – a shoe in. All due respect to the makers of Ascension (a film about modern day China), Attica (the prison, and issues of mass incarceration) Flee (Danish academics?!) and Writing with Fire (about Dalit female reporters), but Questlove’s Summer has real soul in its heart and in its sound.
Will Smith has been nominated for best actor twice before, for the titular role as Muhammad Ali in Ali in 2002 (where he was only kind-of good to be honest, the nom was for the character not the actor playing him) and in 2007 for The Pursuit of Happyness. That’s right, you, like I, do not remember that film.
But as tennis dad Richard Williams in King William, Smith has actually aged into something gritty and dignified. You know? Acting. Plus, his competition for Best Lead Actor is weird. Javier Bardem (Being the Ricardos): terrible. Seriously. Denzel Washington (The Tragedy of Macbeth). He was dynamic in the Shakespearian buskin, but I can’t help but think its black and white rendition, and the fact that nobody saw it, hurts Denzel’s chances. Benedict Cumberbatch (The Power of the Dog): I’m the bad guy here. I didn’t love this film, and found Cumberbatch’s performance a one-note recitation.
For my money, Willie’s only competition is Andrew Garfield playing the late Jonathan Larson in Tick, Tick … Boom! The film, directed by Lin Manuel Miranda was my favorite of the year but got no other nods (sadly) save for Garfield’s mesmerizingly transformative performance. But musicals are always given the stink eye by the Academy. Willie could win it.
Malvern’s Adam McKay was nominated for best original screenplay and best picture for the dark Netflix comedy Don’t Look Up – with kudos in the co-write department by David Sirota, who grew up in Montgomery County. McKay didn’t receive a best director nod, so that’s weird. The film is bleak, timely and hilarious. He did win in the past for Best Adapted Screenplay on 2016’s The Big Shirt so he had victory chops. And his competition for Best Original Screenplay (Kenneth Branagh’s Belfast, Zach Baylin’s King Richard, Paul Thomas Anderson’s Licorice Pizza and Jachim Trier’s The Worst Person in the World) is weird. Expect that win. Best Picture is, unfortunately going to go to The Power of the Dog.
Congrats too to Havertown-native Elizabeth Mirzaei who got an Oscar nomination for the short documentary Three Songs for Benazir, which she directed with her husband, Gulistan. You can see their tale of an Afghan newlywed and his pregnant wife on Netflix. I can’t lie. I didn’t see it. But Philly love to you.
The Academy Awards will air on Sunday, March 27, on ABC.
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