Best Supporting Actress 1994

1927/28 through 1997

Best Supporting Actress 1994

Rosemary Harris - Tom & Viv
4
8%
Helen Mirren - The Madness of King George
4
8%
Meg Tilly - Bullets Over Broadway
9
19%
Uma Thurman - Pulp Fiction
6
13%
Dianne Wiest - Bullets Over Broadway
25
52%
 
Total votes: 48

anonymous1980
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Post by anonymous1980 »

I've always preferred Jennifer Tilly over Dianne Wiest. Though I understood why Wiest won.

Thurman and Wiest were pretty much locks for the nomination, IIRC. I think Tilly, Harris and Mirren were kind of minor suprises, am I right? The Forrest Gump ladies (Field, Wright) and Dunst were more expected, I believe.
Sabin
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Post by Sabin »

Wiest. Absolutely.

I don't really understand this lineup. Hindsight is 20/20 but I can't imagine A) ever coming close to predicting these nominees, or B) voters actually casting their ballots this way. Prognosticating fifteen years after-the-fact is a waste of time, but I can't imagine not predicting the nominees would be:

Sally Field, Forrest Gump
Uma Thurman, Pulp Fiction
Dianne Wiest, Bullets over Broadway
Robin Wright, Forrest Gump
...and either Kirsten Dunst or Rosemary Harris. It becomes easier to envision Harry carried along because the Best Actress field was so weak that Richardson, I guess, was a viable candidate.

Wright's omission baffles me. It utterly baffles me. She is absolutely exceptional in the film. I like Gump even while recognizing its specious politics. Wright does so much to validate Jenny and make her a character of dignity, even as the film desperately attempts to upend her.

Also, you wrote MEG Tilly.




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Big Magilla
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Post by Big Magilla »

In a sense this was the beginning of the modern era of film awards. There still wasn't the proliferation of critics' awards from every city in the country and various other organizations that made awards giving the glut it now is, but this was the first year of the competitive SAG awards.

Together with the Globes, the venerable N.Y., L.A. and National Society Critics' awards, the National Board of Review and the Independent Spirit Awards which had been introduced a few years earlier, all the main players except the Broadcast journalists were in place.

The SAG awards had not yet become a viable predictor of the Oscars. Dianne Wiest was the obvious front-runner having won everything else except the NBR award which went to Rosemary Harris, but who would the other nominees be?

The Globes gave us Robin Wright in Forrest Gump, Kirsten Dunst in Interview With the Vampire, Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction and Sophia Loren in Ready to Wear. SAG gave us Thurman and Wright, but substituted Jamie Lee Curtis in True Lies and Sally Field in Forrest Gump for Dunst and Loren. Oscar approved of Thurman, resurrected Harris and brought in Mirren and Tilly from out of the blue.

My own list of nominees consisted of Dunst, Field and Wright in addition to front-runner Wiest along with Virna Lisi in Queen Margot.

Tilly's nomination I never understand. Mirren had done so much better work before without recognition and would do even more impressive work in the future. Her already seen Prime Suspect 1,2 and 3 on TV probably had more to do with the recognition than her Queen Charlotte.

Harris was and is a lovely actress, but she didn't have all that much to do in Tom & Viv and Thurman I could take or leave.

Wiest, though, was a hoot, the deserved front-runner and the deserved winner for what remains her best screen performance as the alcoholic grand dame in Bullets Over Broadway.
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