Why Brendan Fraser Won the Oscar

when it came to the 95th Academy Awards I would say only two races in the top eight categories were kind of unpredictable best supporting actress and best actor as much as Kate Blanchett dominated the best actress category throughout the first half of award season for her incredible performance in tar you could sense the wind blowing toward Michelle yeoh those last few weeks especially after she won sag and the film independent Spirit award everything everywhere all at once was dominating and voters intense love for it looked to be enough for yo to take the Oscar which she did in case you missed my Jamie Lee Curtis video last month here's proof that I was pretty happy about it goes to Michelle yeah everything everywhere all at once was always winning best original screenplay best supporting actor for kihui Kwan best director and best picture a loss in any of those four categories would have been a shocker and could have signaled things working out differently in both best actress and best supporting actress if the Banshees of in ashiron had taken best original screenplay let's say that could have meant a lack of love for everything everywhere all at once from Academy members enough for Cate Blanchett to take the Oscar for best actress and carry Condon maybe to win best supporting actress over Jamie Lee Curtis in my video last month I talked about the six main reasons why Curtis won in that category a surprise to me on the night Angela Bassett checked off on my ballot for her terrific turn in Black Panther wakanda forever Condon the alternate for me I thought the Curtis sag win was just a sad thing that Curtis just wasn't strong enough and everything everywhere all at once to secure a win at the Oscars turned out I was wrong and now two months later I've even come to admire that victory for one of my favorite actors in the industry the one acting category where the everything everywhere all at once domination didn't help in any way was best actor where nobody from the film was nominated just imagine if there was four acting wins for the same movie would have been an Academy Awards record breaker like what if kiwi Kwan had gone best actor and James Hong had gone best supporting actor it wouldn't have been impossible in my mind but no from the beginning to the end of award season it was never super clear exactly who was going to win best actor at the Oscars I had a feeling very early on long before the Golden Globes and Critics Choice Awards that Brennan Fraser was going to win for his emotionally devastating performance and Darren aronofsky's the whale Fraser had the best narrative in the category and his performances seem the most transformative to me then he took the Critics Choice Award gave a phenomenal speech and then he won at sag in the weeks leading up to the Oscars however there was a lot of love for Austin Butler and Elvis too and many predicted him to win best actor and rightfully so Elvis was well reviewed made lots of money and Butler won a couple of key prizes throughout the season the Golden Globe Award for best actor and a motion picture drama and more significant the bafta award for best actor Butler was everywhere interviews and round tables and red carpets Galore and he's a likable charismatic guy who'd given 110 percent to his amazing performance in Elvis in an awards podcast I did over Zoom a few weeks before the Oscar ceremony I was only one of four people predicting Brendan Fraser the rest predicted Butler and I understood where they were coming from but I held firm to Fraser and on March 12 2023 Jessica Chastain and Halle Berry took to the Oscar stage opened the best actor envelope and said this Brendan fazer I was right Brennan Fraser won after all an awesome Butler looked on clapping a smile plastered on his face even though you can totally tell behind the smile just how disappointed he was understandably because I would bet you the vote was very close Elvis receiving far more Oscar nominations than the whale did and Butler playing a beloved real-life figure known the world over so why did Brendan Fraser win the best actor Oscar and what if any stumbles did Austin Butler make along the way in this video we're talking the fascinating best actor race at the 95th Academy Awards and the many reasons why the great Brennan Fraser took the gold trophy let's begin with reason number one I would argue the main reason Fraser was Victorious at the Academy Awards was narrative narrative narrative when an actor we all adore who for whatever reason kind of Fades into the background for a number of years and then comes roaring back with a career best performance in a movie from a great filmmaker we take notice and as soon as the whale premiered at the Venice Film Festival the awards bus started growing Big Time Fraser who hadn't really had a strong movie role since the 2000s was showing us new shades of his talent and my God was he appreciative remember that video of him breaking down crying at the standing ovation that audience members were giving him at Venice very few actors could have played Charlie in the whale and Fraser turned out to be the perfect choice in a moment in his life when he desperately needed a major career jolt his career in film had suffered for many years due to his alleging that Philip Burke the then president of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association that votes for the Golden Globe Awards had sexually assaulted him at a luncheon in 2003 mix in a divorce and the death of his mother and Fraser struggled in the industry for quite a few years but it was this incident involving Burke that Fraser believed blacklisted him from the industry in in a 2018 GQ piece he said the phone does stop ringing in your career and you start asking yourself why there's many reasons why but was this one of them I think it was upon receiving his Golden Globe nomination for the whale Fraser refused to attend the ceremony where Austin Butler won in this category for Elvis Fraser had for so many years done terrific work and these setbacks he'd suffered offered the ultimate comeback narrative as we entered the 2023 award season awards for his performance in the whale were a way of saying we love you we missed you welcome back to the club I mean I grew up with the guy seeing Encino Man and George of the Jungle and the mummy and my youth and I wondered in the last decade plus where exactly he went I love it when an actor I admire has a glorious comeback and Fraser was the most high profile example of that on his March toward Oscar Victory the second reason Brendan Fraser won the Oscar is that Austin Butler had just enough flaws in against him to keep his victory from happening one of those flaws I would argue is that he was pretty new on the scene it wasn't so much his age although yes he would have been one of the youngest best actor winners in history I just never bought into Butler because he didn't have much of an acclaimed body of work prior to Elvis sure you could argue Eddie Redmayne and Rami Malek were young best actor winners too but they had been in tons of films I'd seen before their eventual Oscar wins Butler's career goes back many years but there wasn't much he did on a large scale at least in the movies many of us were just starting to get to know him in his interviews for Elvis and part of me felt like Academy boaters didn't feel the need to give him the top prize quite yet another flaw he had I still believe was having to shine outside of that abysmal Tom Hanks supporting performance I liked Elvis at times but the Hank's turn was so off-putting so weird that I always struggled finding my bearings while watching the movie if Hanks had delivered a fantastic supporting performance that got him nominations at Golden Globe sag and the Oscars that would have helped Butler but it was almost like he had to separate himself from Hanks on the award circuit when hanks's participation would have been a major benefit one other flaw with Butler's chances was that Elvis had come out way back in June while the whale was released in December and could be fresher in voters minds of course the big winner everything everywhere all at once had opened way back in April and yet continued building up steam for months peaking at just the right time after sag but that I would say was an anomaly and not the norm I mean if the whale had come out in June and Elvis had been released in December Butler probably wins all said and done but I would say the buzz around Elvis kind of peaked throughout the summer and it never really found its way back in early 2023 the third reason he won is that outside of Butler let's face it Fraser didn't have any competition in the best actor category Paul mask goal for after sun that was the definition of a just happy to be their nomination in a claimed film that unfortunately received no Oscar nominations in any other category Bill Nye for living in a different year with bigger box office more advertising and one best actor precursor win he could have had a small chance I guess I thought he could win at bafta but when Butler won there the tiny outside shot at further wins for Nye was over and then Colin Farrell's performance in the Banshees of in a Sharon is a great one it's actually my favorite in the category but as soon as I saw the film I didn't think he had much of a chance at the Oscar win it's some of the best work he's ever done but I just didn't think enough Academy members would go for it he won the Golden Globe and the comedy or musical category early on an important First Step but when he lost a bafta after Kerry Condon and Barry key Hogan had both won in the supporting categories his chances at the Oscars were pretty close to zilch so at the end of the day the one person Fraser needed to beat was Butler and Butler alone now getting back to the Oscar for a minute you're gonna win you know that right I mean I don't know that well here's the way I look at it they say your main competition is this Austin Butler he's still running around like he's Elvis I can understand what he's challenged with when you really commit to a role because I'm guilty of wearing cowboy hats long after I stop playing Cowboys the fourth reason is that Fraser's performance was the most outwardly transformative and emotional of the bunch think what you want of the whale you can't deny Fraser is freaking going for it in that movie his scenes of crying and anguish are often difficult to watch in their intensity and under all that makeup and Prosthetics Fraser manages to make Charlie a three-dimensional human being despite some screenplay missteps in the whale Fraser breathes life into a character that with another actor could have been cheesy or like he was trying too hard Fraser finds just the right note and acts the hell out of some truly devastating moments the fifth reason Fraser won was the whales key Oscar victory for best makeup early in the awards telecast so many people argue that Austin Butler would win because Elvis got into best picture and managed eight Oscar nods total while the whale missed best picture and only picked up three nods but I was feeling all season long that the whale could be another The Iron Lady a movie that also didn't get into best picture but did win best makeup and a top acting prize Meryl Streep for best actress I never thought the whale needed that best picture nomination I thought if it could win best makeup at the Oscars then Brennan Fraser would take home the best actor trophy too and wouldn't you know it that's exactly how it worked out the sixth reason was Darren Aronofsky the extraordinary filmmaker who had directed many of his actors to Oscar nominations before including one glorious win my favorite acting Oscar win of the 2010s the man has been responsible for so many awards for his actors starting with Ellen bursten for requiem him for a dream Mickey Rourke got very close to an Oscar win for the wrestler in 2009 and then two years after that Natalie Portman won best actress for Black Swan although aronofsky's last couple movies flopped big time at the Oscars I always felt like the whale might be the movie to bring one of his actors back into the game and even net them the big win what do you make of all the Oscar bows surrounding the film for your performance I know not all that may come but come with me I will go to it laughing Herman Melville the seventh reason was that Hong Chow got into the best supporting actors category at the Academy Awards which showed support for the film in acting Beyond just the Fraser performance I still think Fraser could have won the Oscar if Chow had been passed over for Dolly de Leon but her being there allowed more people to consider two strong performances in the film not just one again I think if Tom Hanks had been nominated all over the place and best supporting actor for Elvis that would have helped Butler win best actor but near the end of the season Butler was all on his own while Fraser had Chow by his side The Talented actress brought to tears upon his Oscar Victory the eighth reason was Fraser's incredibly emotional speech upon his win for best actor at the Critics Choice Awards his losing best actor in a drama at the Golden Globes as well as him not even being there wasn't exactly unexpected given his history with the hfpa but still the loss did not start his award season on the right foot however that Critics Choice victory over Butler and Farrell was the key step in the right direction he needed his beautiful speech that ends with him almost in tears building his Awards momentum directly thereafter the ninth reason was the other big precursor victory for Fraser that critical best actor win at the Screen Actors Guild Awards everyone thought the bafta win for Butler meant that he was probably going to win the Oscar but we saw this year that bafta meant almost nothing when it came to the Oscars and that sag was the much better prognosticator sag going 4-4 at the Academy Awards in the acting categories while bafta went zero for four we'll never know for sure but I'm near 100 that if Austin Butler had one best actor at sag he would have won the Oscar sag this year happened right before final Oscar voting began and I do think that ceremony especially these days plays an important role in award season Fraser winning there and giving another phenomenal speech was the final boost he needed to take the Oscar the tenth and final reason Brendan Fraser won the best actor Oscar I would say is that his performance simply stays with you the longest I like the whale more than others but it wasn't in my top 10 of 2022 it might not have even been in the top 30. the film has its problems to be sure however Fraser is not one of them he makes the character of Charlie so warm and sad and funny and heartbreak breaking his performance made me cry in the theater on two separate occasions and I kept thinking about his emotional turn weeks after seeing the film as great as Austin Butler is and Elvis his work just didn't stick with me as long and I wonder if the same thing happened for lots of Academy voters there's something about Fraser's performance in the whale that's like a punch to the gut and many Academy members probably decided late in the game to go with him so because of all 10 of those reasons Brennan Fraser beat out Austin Butler to win the best actor Academy Award once again Fraser gave a tremendous speech gentlemen he laid your whale-sized hearts bear so that we could see into your souls like no one else could do and it is my honor to be named alongside you in this category Fraser and Butler both have exciting projects on the way Fraser a small part of Martin scorsese's killers of the flower Moon Butler and the highly anticipated Dune part 2 from director Denise Villeneuve I would bet the enormously talented Butler will win an Oscar one day that his time is still coming but in 2023 that best actor Oscar Wynn belonged to someone else for a simply dazzling dramatic performance I don't know about you but I am very happy that for the rest of time we can all say Academy Award winner Brendan Fraser thanks so much for watching if you enjoyed this video don't forget to like And subscribe and let me know in the comments below who you wanted to win the best actor Oscar at this year's ceremony was Brennan Fraser the right person to take the trophy we'll see you next time

Channel: The Awards Contender

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Id: A5pozqpACHk

Length: 16min 57sec (1017 seconds)

Published: Tue May 09 2023