For the first time in a quarter century, a new Oscar category is upon us. Beginning in 2026, honoring films from 2025, the Academy will recognize the best casting of the year. It’s a long-overdue and well-deserved recognition for the casting directors who place such an integral building block in a film’s production but have not yet received their moment in the awards spotlight.
We’ll never know who would have won best casting over the first 96 years of the Oscars, had the category been introduced way back at the inaugural ceremony. But, with a little math and a little speculation, we can at least make some educated guesses to fill in this nearly-century-long gap in Oscar history. Before diving in, a few data points to guide us:
Precursor Awards: We do have a few in more recent years. The Casting Society of America’s Artios Awards were first held in 1985, though they break their winners up by genre. The Screen Actors Guild first awarded its best cast trophy in 1996, which is related but not identical to casting. The BAFTAs first introduced a casting category in 2020.
Correlation with other categories: Using the SAG best cast award as a proxy, 50 percent of winners are best picture winners, 97 percent are best picture nominees, 32 percent are best director winners, 66 percent are best director nominees, 18 percent are best actor/actress winners, and 36 percent are best supporting actor winners. These films have an average 0.4 nominations for best actor/actress and 1.3 nominations for supporting actor/actress. Importantly, note that the supporting categories are more closely related to winning best cast than the lead categories are.
Correlation among existing categories: In general, the Oscars don’t spread the wealth. Best picture-winning films account for 29 percent of all winning films in all feature-length, non-genre-specific categories. Best picture-nominated films account for 68 percent of all winning films in all feature-length, non-genre-specific categories. So if the Academy likes a movie overall, they tend to prefer it in every category up and down the ballot, and it’s reasonable to assume this would also apply to best casting.
Bigger cast size is better: On average, SAG best cast nominees to win the award have 10.6 primary credited actors. On average, SAG best cast nominees to lose the award have 8.7 primary credited actors. The more, the merrier.
But these facts alone are insufficient to invent an alternate history. There is still a fair amount of common sense and guesswork in the list that’s about to follow. I did my very best to ignore my own personal opinions of these films — this is a list of what would have won, not a list of what should have won — but it’s impossible to eliminate all bias in this type of exercise. I’m sure that any two film historians making a similar list would have plenty of differences, and those differences make for plenty of fun debates.
Without further ado, a walk through the imaginary history of the Oscar for best casting:
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1927-28: 7th Heaven
Image Credit: Everett Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell were perfectly teamed up for their first of 12 pictures together. I could also make the case for Sunrise, another portion of Janet Gaynor’s best actress win, which was split across three films.
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1928-29: The Broadway Melody
Image Credit: Everett No film won more than one Oscar this year, but The Broadway Melody won best picture and earned an acting nomination for Bessie Love. The Divine Lady and In Old Arizona would have been strong contenders, too.
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1929-30: The Big House
Image Credit: Everett The Divorcee is another notable nominee, though perhaps voters would have been dissuaded by the fact that the film’s star, Norma Shearer, was married to the film’s producer, Irving Thalberg. Disraeli’s casting was recycled from the 1921 silent version (George Arliss starred in both). So, I’ll go with the big prison cast from The Big House.
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1930-31: Cimarron
Image Credit: Everett The first film with nominations for best picture, director, actor, and actress would have charged to a best casting win. Its stiffest competition: A Free Soul, which won best actor for Lionel Barrymore.
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1931-32: The Champ
Image Credit: Everett There’s no clear answer this year. You could argue that Grand Hotel would have won for its star-studded cast, but the film only received one total nomination, even if it was a best picture winner. The Guardsman was the only film with multiple acting nominations, but the two leads had previously been cast in the stage version. That leaves The Champ, which won best actor for Wallace Beery and featured an even better performance by nine-year-old Jackie Cooper.
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1932-33: Cavalcade
Image Credit: Everett The best picture and best director winner, with an acting nomination for Diana Wynyard amidst a sizeable cast, would have been the frontrunner.
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1934: It Happened One Night
Image Credit: Everett An easy pick. The first film to win the “Big Five” categories would have added a sixth Oscar to its tally for the comedic pairing of Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert.
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1935: Mutiny on the Bounty
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection The first of three films to score three lead acting nominations (followed by From Here to Eternity and Network) would have sailed to a best casting trophy.
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1936: My Man Godfrey
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection This film suffered a difficult Oscar season. It remains to this day the only movie nominated for all four acting awards to not be nominated for best picture, and it went on to go 0/6 on the big night. In our rewrite of history, My Man Godfrey wins its first Oscar for casting.
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1937: The Life of Emile Zola
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection A best picture win, a best actor nomination for Paul Muni, and a best supporting actor win for Joseph Schildkraut indicate that this moving tirade against antisemitism would have been the casting winner.
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1938: Jezebel
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection The first film to win both a lead (Bette Davis) and a supporting (Fay Bainter) acting Oscar would have garnered a third trophy for casting, tying it with The Adventures of Robin Hood for the most wins of the year.
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1939: Gone With the Wind
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection No surprises here. The Academy of 1939 adored Gone With the Wind. It set new records for most wins (8) and most nominations (13). Had there been a best casting category, those figures would have been 9 and 14.
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1940: Rebecca
Image Credit: Photofest This is a really hard one. I gave the edge to the best picture winner with three acting nominations, but I could easily make the case that The Philadelphia Story or The Grapes of Wrath would have been the winner that year.
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1941: How Green Was My Valley
Image Credit: 20th Century-Fox Film Corporation/Courtesy Everett Collection A friendly reminder that this article covers who would have won at that time, not who should have won in hindsight. Citizen Kane fans will rightly protest this verdict, but it’s hard to argue that Orson Welles casting himself would have beaten out a movie that won best picture, director, and supporting actor, with a supporting actress nomination to boot.
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1942: Mrs. Miniver
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection The first film to earn five acting nominations would have easily won best casting, a precursor to its trophies later that evening for best supporting actress (Teresa Wright), actress (Greer Garson), director (William Wyler), and picture.
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1943: For Whom the Bell Tolls
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection I consider this the most competitive year to date. For Whom the Bell Tolls gets the nod for its four acting nominations, but especially for casting Katina Paxinou in her Oscar-winning film debut. But The Song of Bernadette also had four nominations and made a star out of Jennifer Jones, another Oscar winner that year. Oh, and there was another movie that year by the name of … [checks notes] … Casablanca.
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1944: Going My Way
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection The Academy liked the acting in Going My Way so much that they strangely nominated Barry Fitzgerald for both lead and supporting actor. Fitzgerald won supporting, while his co-star Bing Crosby won the lead category. Since You Went Away and Gaslight are also solid choices here.
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1945: Mildred Pierce
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection The trio of Joan Crawford, Eve Arden, and Ann Blyth all nailed their roles in this extremely well-cast film noir. Crawford won best actress, the other two were nominated for supporting actress, and the film would have earned a second trophy for best casting.
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1946: The Best Years of Our Lives
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection The bold decision to cast Harold Russell, a disabled World War II veteran with no prior acting experience, paid off in spades, both for the quality of the film and its fortunes at the Oscars.
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1947: Gentleman’s Agreement
With four acting nominations including a win for Celeste Holm, Elia Kazan’s best-picture-winning film would have added a victory in casting to its tally.
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1948: Johnny Belinda
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection It’s a tough choice between Johnny Belinda and I Remember Mama, with four acting nominations apiece, but I’ll break the tie with the film voters liked more overall. That’s clearly Johnny Belinda, which had five more nominations than any other movie that year.
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1949: All the King’s Men
Image Credit: Everett Columbia Pictures was hoping for a bigger box office draw than Broderick Crawford to headline their adaptation of the best-selling novel. Director Robert Rossen proved them wrong, and stuck with Crawford who went on to win best actor.
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1950: All About Eve
Image Credit: Everett Film fans debate All About Eve vs. Sunset Boulevard to this very day, but I actually feel reasonably confident in my guess that the Academy would have opted for All About Eve in a casting category, based on the impressive range of the cast itself and the film’s other Oscar successes.
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1951: A Streetcar Named Desire
Image Credit: Everett One of only three films, along with Network and Everything Everywhere All at Once, to win three acting Oscars. I do have some hesitation with this pick, since so much of the casting was done for the stage version four years earlier. But I’m wagering that the addition of Vivien Leigh, who was not in the stage version, would have been enough for Oscar voters at the time.
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1952: Viva Zapata!
Image Credit: Everett This was the single hardest year for me to choose; there just isn’t a single film that stands out as the clear choice. I ultimately opted for epic Mexican biopic that won Anthony Quinn an Oscar, but plenty of other choices are equally reasonable.
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1953: From Here to Eternity
Image Credit: Everett The second film to win both supporting acting categories – for Frank Sinatra and Donna Reed – probably would have won best casting for a different choice: placing the usually proper Deborah Kerr in a very different role than her previous films, to great effect.
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1954: On the Waterfront
Image Credit: Photofest Marlon Brando’s win was considered somewhat of an upset at the time, but in hindsight, it was an excellent decision. But On the Waterfront was hardly a one-man show: Eva Marie Saint won supporting actress, and the film commanded an impressive three of the five spots in the supporting actor shortlist, combining for an unbelievable casting job.
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1955: Rebel Without a Cause
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection I could make a strong case for Marty, the sweet best picture winner with a best actor win for Ernest Borgnine and a pair of supporting nods. My hunch is that the smaller cast size might have doomed it in this category, opening the door for the casting of James Dean (who had sadly passed away by the time of the Oscars), Natalie Wood, and Sal Mineo to win the day in Rebel Without a Cause.
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1956: Giant
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection In all likelihood, a movie about family dynamics in a Texas oil dynasty was going to win this category. It’s just a question of which movie: Written on the Wind or Giant. I would lean towards a second consecutive win for a James Dean film.
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1957: Sayonara
Image Credit: Everett This would have been a heavyweight bout between Sayonara (winner of both supporting categories) and Peyton Place (five total acting nominations). Both featured the casting of newcomers making impressive film debuts. Sayonara would have been rightfully criticized today for its casting of a non-Japanese actor in a Japanese role via makeup that we would now consider to be racist. But in 1957, voters probably would have been fine with that casting choice.
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1958: Separate Tables
Image Credit: Everett An all-star cast of Rita Hayworth, Burt Lancaster, Gladys Cooper, Rod Taylor, and Oscar nominee Deborah Kerr. And those were the stars who didn’t win Oscars for the film — David Niven and Wendy Hiller both accomplished that.
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1959: Ben-Hur
Image Credit: Courtesy of Macmillan Prior to this year, the record for most Oscar wins by one film was 9, set just one year earlier by Gigi. Ben-Hur reached new heights with 11, but it likely would have been 12 had a best casting category existed.
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1960: The Apartment
Image Credit: Photofest Elmer Gantry is a fine choice here, as it won acting Oscars for Burt Lancaster and Shirley Jones. But The Apartment was the more beloved film by the Academy overall, with three acting nominations to go with its wins for best picture and director.
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1961: West Side Story
Image Credit: Photofest Winning both supporting categories (for Rita Moreno and George Chakiris), likely the two most important categories to win en route to a casting Oscars, West Side Story is pretty hard to ignore. If it weren’t for that, Judgment at Nuremberg and The Hustler would both be very reasonable predictions.
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1962: To Kill a Mockingbird
Image Credit: Everett This year featured a couple of terrific casting choices for child actresses. Patty Duke (The Miracle Worker) won the Oscar, but given that she had previously been cast in the play, my hunch is the Academy would have awarded best casting to the folks who chose Mary Badham to play Scout Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird. Though don’t rule out the large, star-studded cast of Lawrence of Arabia.
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1963: Tom Jones
Image Credit: Everett In many years, Hud’s casting of Patricia Neal and Melvyn Douglas (both Oscar winners that season) would have been enough. And who can forget the brilliant ensemble casting of It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. But it’s hard to overlook a best picture winner that earns five acting nominations, including a full 60 percent of the supporting actress category.
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1964: Zorba the Greek
Image Credit: Everett The choice of Lila Kedrova, who won an Oscar for her first English-language film, might have been enough to put Zorba over the top. My Fair Lady would have been its chief competition, but half of the main characters were already cast in their same roles in the stage version.
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1965: The Sound of Music
Image Credit: Everett Three of the strongest contenders of the decade all fall into a single year. The Sound of Music with pitch-perfect casting for all seven children. Othello with many of the greats of the British stage. Or Ship of Fools with an ensemble cast including Oscar nominees Oskar Werner, Simone Signoret, and Michael Dunn. Take your pick.
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1966: Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Image Credit: Everett This is the one and only year in which I’m guessing that a film with such a small cast would have won best casting. With a lack of stiff competition (A Man for All Seasons might be next up) and a nominations list that literally included every single credited actor, if any small-cast film could pull it off, it’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?.
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1967: Bonnie and Clyde
Image Credit: Everett Bonnie and Clyde might have run up against opposition in this category due to producer Warren Beatty casting himself, but the film still earned four additional acting nominations including a win for Estelle Parsons. Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, the final Spencer Tracy-Katharine Hepburn pairing, would have been a sentimental choice. And The Graduate would have been in contention as well.
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1968: Oliver!
Image Credit: Everett The casting team for Oliver! combined a large group of relatively unknown actors, many of them children, to forge a best-picture-winning musical. That’s probably good enough to beat out The Heart is a Lonely Hunter’s discovery of Sonda Locke, among other nominees that year.
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1969: They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?
Image Credit: Everett I can tell you who the nominees would have been with more confidence than the winner. They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?, Midnight Cowboy, Anne of the Thousand Days, Bob & Carol & Ted Alice, and Cactus Flower are my best bets to have made the shortlist, but picking a winner among them is like throwing darts.
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1970: Airport
Image Credit: Everett The classic disaster film with a cast of stars, a supporting actress win for Helen Hayes, and a best picture nomination is the most likely winner here.
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1971: The Last Picture Show
Image Credit: Everett The Last Picture Show achieved both a win (Ben Johnson/Cloris Leachman) and a second nomination (Jeff Bridges/Ellen Burstyn) in both of the two supporting categories. Safe to say the Academy strongly approved of the casting for this film.
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1972: The Godfather
Image Credit: Everett I don’t think this is quite as obvious as people may assume. Cabaret won two acting Oscars as well as best director, and actually would have given The Godfather a run for its money in best casting. But probably best not to overthink this one.
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1973: Paper Moon
Image Credit: Everett Another battle of child actresses. Between Paper Moon (carried by Tatum O’Neal) and The Exorcist (carried by Linda Blair), I’ll give the edge to Paper Moon in the casting category since those same voters chose O’Neal head-to-head for supporting actress.
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1974: Murder on the Orient Express
Image Credit: Everett Despite The Godfather Part II dominating the night in general and the supporting actor category in particular, too many of its stars also took part in the first film for it to be the best casting frontrunner. And besides, Murder on the Orient Express with its cast of every 1970s British film star seems like a movie born to win this award.
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1975: One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
Image Credit: Everett Nashville is hard to overlook with its massive ensemble cast and best picture nomination. But the Academy so adored One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, granting it all five of the most prominent categories, that it has to be my choice here.
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1976: Network
Image Credit: Everett In the bicentennial year’s best casting race, Rocky, Taxi Driver, and All the President’s Men would have strong credentials, but also the deep misfortune of running up against the Network buzzsaw, a winner of three acting Oscars and to this day the most recent film with five acting nominations.
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1977: Julia
Image Credit: Everett Julia would have won best casting for its choices of Jason Robards, Vanessa Redgrave, Jane Fonda, and Maximilian Schell. Little could voters have known that its most important casting decision (in terms of historical importance) was giving a young actress by the name of Meryl Streep a chance to make her film debut. Star Wars’ casting is iconic today, but it would have been a long shot to win this category in 1977.
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1978: Coming Home
Image Credit: Everett That’s two in a row for Jane Fonda movies. While Fonda herself had a role in creating Coming Home, making her casting all but assured, the movie still did manage three other acting nominations including a win for Jon Voight. If voters were looking to go in a different direction, The Deer Hunter would have been the most likely pivot.
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1979: Kramer vs. Kramer
I suppose it isn’t that hard to make good casting decisions when Meryl Streep and Dustin Hoffman are available to play the leads. But it’s the casting of Justin Henry, still the record-holder for youngest Oscar nominee, that puts Kramer vs. Kramer over the top.
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1980: Raging Bull
Image Credit: Courtesy of Everett Collection Raging Bull’s most important decision was Martin Scorsese teaming up with Robert De Niro. But it’s the discovery of Joe Pesci and Cathy Moriarty that really stands out when judging this film against Ordinary People for the best casting of the year.
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1981: Reds
Image Credit: Everett Reds would have been a controversial winner, since Warren Beatty decided to cast himself in the lead role. But he also cast an impressive variety of actors and non-actors alike, three of whom (in addition to himself) went on to Oscar nominations. On Golden Pond won Oscars for both of its leads, but half of the casting was Jane Fonda giving roles to herself and her father.
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1982: Gandhi
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection The data doesn’t exactly back this up: Gandhi only had one acting nomination (a win for Ben Kingsley), whereas Tootsie and Victor/Victoria each had three. But we’re still talking about a film that Academy voters raved about, granting it eight Oscars including best picture, director, actor, and original screenplay, and a film that had a very large, very well-cast ensemble.
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1983: Terms of Endearment
Image Credit: Everett Unlike Gandhi, Terms of Endearment doesn’t have the biggest cast. What it lacks in size it makes up for in terrific performances by Oscar winners Shirley MacLaine and Jack Nicholson, along with Oscar nominee John Lithgow.
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1984: The Killing Fields
Image Credit: Everett The duo of F. Murray Abraham and Tom Hulce were perfectly cast as famed rival composers in the best picture winner, Amadeus, which also won the inaugural Artios Awards from the Casting Society of America. But I’m going with The Killing Fields, which tied Amadeus for acting wins and nominations. Putting first-time actor Haing S. Ngor, himself a real-life survivor of the Cambodian prison camps, in Oscar-winning position is a tough act to beat.
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1985: The Color Purple
Image Credit: Everett The casting team took some risks here, largely eschewing well-established film stars, and they got every pick just right: Whoopi Goldberg, Danny Glover, Oprah Winfrey, and Margaret Avery are what made The Color Purple such a powerhouse.
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1986: Hannah and Her Sisters
Image Credit: Everett It’s so hard to not pick Children of a Lesser God, with its three acting nominations including a win for Marlee Matlin in her film debut. But seeing as the data shows the supporting categories to be more predictive, and given that Children of a Lesser God has such a small cast, I’m giving this year to Hannah and Her Sisters, which won both supporting categories.
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1987: Moonstruck
Image Credit: Everett The two leading ladies, Cher and Olympia Dukakis, both won Oscars for their roles. Add in Nicolas Cage and Vincent Gardenia, and it’s easy to make the case that the casting made Moonstruck what it is more than any other that year.
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1988: Working Girl
Image Credit: Andy Schwartz/20th Century Fox/Everett Collection All three of the main actresses – Melanie Griffith, Joan Cusack, and Sigourney Weaver – were nominated for their performances, and the men – Harrison Ford and Alec Baldwin – more than held their own.
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1989: Driving Miss Daisy
It’s not the biggest cast, and it famously missed out on a best director nomination, but Driving Miss Daisy’s three acting nominations, Jessica Tandy’s win, and the best picture win are probably enough to make it the casting frontrunner. My Left Foot, winner of two acting Oscars, is the other title to consider.
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1990: Goodfellas
Image Credit: Everett Collection While Goodfellas is now regarded as a first-tier classic in hindsight, this is one of the weaker years for casting nominees the day the Oscar was decided. Dances with Wolves clearly had the most support overall, but with Kevin Costner casting himself, that might have been an uphill battle.
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1991: The Silence of the Lambs
Image Credit: Orion Pictures Corp/Everett Collection Just one year after another mafia movie won, Bugsy would have had a modest chance. But in all likelihood, The Silence of the Lambs’ Oscar dominance would have extended to the best casting category.
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1992: Howards End
Image Credit: Everett The Player is an outside-the-box choice, for all of its celebrity cameos. Unforgiven makes the most sense on paper, but producer Clint Eastwood casting himself probably doesn’t help. That leaves The Crying Game and Howards End as the only two others with even two acting nominations; I’ll go with the one of those that won an acting category.
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1993: The Piano
Image Credit: Everett 1993 had many more compelling options than 1992. My best estimate is that The Piano would have claimed the casting Oscar, thanks to putting Holly Hunter and a young Anna Paquin (making her film debut) in their Oscar-winning roles
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1994: Bullets Over Broadway
Image Credit: Everett I look forward to the Twitter reaction I’ll get for this pick! Not Forrest Gump, not The Shawshank Redemption, not Pulp Fiction. But I’m working on the assumption that the Academy would have opted towards the ensemble cast for best casting, especially after granting it a supporting actress win (Dianne Wiest) and two more supporting nominations (Chazz Palminteri, Jennifer Tilly).
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1995: Apollo 13
Image Credit: Universal/Courtesy Everett Collection This is the first year where we get the benefit of referencing the Screen Actors Guild results. While their choice of Apollo 13 wasn’t enough to launch it above Braveheart for best picture, I believe it would have portended a best casting win.
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1996: The English Patient
Image Credit: Everett I know I just referenced relying on the SAG Awards, but not when they’re this far off from the Academy. The Actors Guild went for The Birdcage, but with only one Oscar nod (for Art Direction), it’s really hard to imagine there was enough love for it among Oscar voters to win best casting. Instead, I bet it would have been a 10th win for the much-more-revered The English Patient, the only movie to win more than 2 Oscars that year.
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1997: Titanic
Image Credit: 20th Century Fox Film Corp. All rights reserved./Courtesy Everett Collection This one is less for the leads – the Academy nominated Kate but not Leo – and more for the large number of historical figures on the boat that the film found very strong matches for in Hollywood. As Good as It Gets won for both leads, but there was so much Oscar buzz around James Cameron’s film that it would have been hard to stop.
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1998: Shakespeare in Love
Image Credit: Everett Like Titanic, this is another film with a large number of historical characters who were very well cast. Plenty of film fans still wish Saving Private Ryan had been more successful at this year’s ceremony, but that doesn’t change the fact that Oscar voters lined up behind Shakespeare.
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1999: American Beauty
Image Credit: Everett If Haley Joel Osment had won for his role in The Sixth Sense, as opposed to just getting nominated, this one might have come out differently. But in the absence of that, I don’t think there’s another film with a strong enough resume this year to prevent the best picture and best actor winner, which also took top honors at the Artios Awards, from earning a casting crown.
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2000: Traffic
Image Credit: Everett Yes, it only earned one acting nomination (a win for Benicio del Toro), but this feels like a movie built to win best casting. With three thematically interwoven storylines, no individual actor (other than del Toro) got enough of the spotlight to get an Oscar invitation, but collectively they made the film what it is.
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2001: Gosford Park
Image Credit: Everett Can I justify writing down Harry Potter or Ocean’s 11, movies so filled with wonderful casting choices that they made entire franchises click for a decade? Nope, not enough evidence to suggest the Academy would go for it. Can I defend Lord of the Rings? Perhaps, but zero acting nominations isn’t a great sign. I’ll go with the SAG winner, Gosford Park, a big ensemble murder mystery which garnered nominations for Helen Mirren and Maggie Smith.
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2002: Chicago
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection The two movies to win supporting acting categories – Chicago and Adaptation – would have gone head-to-head for best casting. The safe pick is the one that earned four acting nominations, a best picture win, and a SAG win for best cast.
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2003: Mystic River
Image Credit: Everett The true darkhorse candidate is Love Actually. If any film could pull off a casting win despite no other nominations in any categories, it’s a beloved ensemble film like that one. Lord of the Rings is also an intriguing pick, but I’m skeptical that best casting will be the domain of sequels. I’ll opt for the same choice as the Artios Awards, the movie that won Oscars for Sean Penn and Tim Robbins.
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2004: The Aviator
Image Credit: Everett The Aviator, Million Dollar Baby, and Sideways would have faced off in a three-horse race. Million Dollar Baby had the better Oscar night and Sideways won at the SAG Awards. But I’d lean towards The Aviator, a bigger cast portraying historical figures.
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2005: Crash
Image Credit: Everett I realize this choice is strange. On paper, Brokeback Mountain, Capote, and Walk the Line all would have entered the night with a better chance to win. But if Crash had enough support from the voters to pull off one of the biggest best picture upsets in history, and it had a SAG Award and a large ensemble cast to boot, I’m guessing it also would have scored an upset for best casting.
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2006: Little Miss Sunshine
Image Credit: Fox Searchlight/Courtesy Everett Collection This is the most competitive year of the decade, with a decent case to be made for Dreamgirls or The Departed. But I’m sticking with the Screen Actors Guild on this one, not just because of the Alan Arkin win, but also because of the discovery of a young Abigail Breslin whose casting made the movie shine.
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2007: Michael Clayton
Image Credit: Everett Michael Clayton had three acting nominations including a supporting actress win for Tilda Swinton. Maybe the Academy would have opted for one of the one-nomination films, like No Country for Old Men – another Ellen Chenoweth nomination – or Juno, but there isn’t enough evidence to get behind either of them.
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2008: Doubt
Image Credit: Courrtesy of Miramax Films/Photofest A strange year, in which neither of the two strongest best cast contenders – Doubt and The Dark Knight – were up for best picture. Heath Ledger’s untimely passing would have built momentum for The Dark Knight, but there was a lot more awards-season love for the full cast of Doubt.
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2009: Inglorious Basterds
Image Credit: Everett This might have been one of the night’s best races, between Precious and Inglorious Basterds. Both films walked away with a supporting acting win. I’ll give Inglorious Basterds the 51-49 margin in this category thanks to its Artios and SAG wins.
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2010: The Fighter
Image Credit: Jojo Whilden/Fighter Oscar fans remember this year as a race between The King’s Speech and The Social Network, but for best casting I’m going with … neither of those. The Fighter was the first film in 24 years to win both supporting categories, and that might have barely been enough to overcome the wider awards-season support for the other two.
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2011: The Help
Image Credit: Dale Robinette/DreamWorks Oscar winner Octavia Spencer, Oscar nominee Viola Davis, and Oscar nominee Jessica Chastain were all perfectly cast in this best picture nominee. Enough to fend off the coattails of The Artist? I say yes.
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2012: Silver Linings Playbook
Image Credit: JoJo Whilden/©Weinstein Company/courtesy Everett Collection I briefly toyed with Argo, which had as deep a cast as any movie of this decade. But with only one acting nomination and no directing nomination, I’m not sure it had enough of a resume to beat out another David O. Russell film (two years after The Fighter), one that had nominations in all four acting categories.
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2013: 12 Years a Slave
If the previous picks are correct, the Academy might have tired of awarding this category to David O. Russell’s filmography and bypassed American Hustle. That would open the door for either Dallas Buyers Club, winner of best actor and supporting actor, or 12 Years a Slave, winner of best supporting actress and best picture.
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2014: Birdman
Image Credit: Everett I don’t know what to make of Boyhood’s chances here. Casting a team of actors and then crossing fingers it will work out for the next dozen years is quite a feat. But Birdman had three acting nominations, won best picture, and won the SAG Award, so that seems like the more straightforward pick.
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2015: Spotlight
If Jacob Tremblay had been nominated for Room, I might have leaned in that direction. In the absence of that data point, I’ll give this one to the best picture winner featuring a strong ensemble cast and a pair of supporting acting nominees, though not with a ton of conviction.
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2016: Moonlight
Image Credit: David Bornfriend, ©A24/courtesy Everett Collection Or did I mean to write La La Land? Sorry, I couldn’t help myself. Mahershala Ali won and Naomie Harris was nominated for the year’s eventual best picture winner, which did a nice job casting people at all three eras of the Chiron’s life.
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2017: Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Image Credit: Courtesy of Fox Searchlight Pictures This is a pretty easy pick. Frances McDormand and Sam Rockwell won Oscars for the film, which also took home best ensemble from the Screen Actors Guild.
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2018: The Favourite
Image Credit: Atsushi Nishijima Fox Searchlight Pictures / Courtesy Everett Collection I don’t have a clue on this one. Black Panther won the SAG but got zero acting nominations from the Oscars. Green Book won supporting actor but wasn’t nominated by the SAG Awards. Maybe Vice? Maybe BlacKkKlansman? If The Favourite had enough momentum to surprise by tying for the most nominations, and to surprise again with a best actress win, perhaps it would have also surprised with a best casting victory.
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2019: Parasite
Image Credit: Neon/Courtesy Everett Collection I’m finally doing it. In Year #93, for the first time, I’m picking a winner with zero nominations for acting. If the SAG Awards could give it best ensemble despite zero acting nominations, well then so can I. You could make the case for Little Women or Once Upon a Time in Hollywood or perhaps even Knives Out, but I’ll stick with the best picture winner, Parasite.
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2020: The Trial of the Chicago 7
Image Credit: Courtesy of Everett Collection I have no idea what the Academy would have thought of Nomadland in this category, seeing as they cast read-life nomads in a number of roles. The more conventional pick is Minari, but with such a small cast, I’ll instead opt for the Artios and SAG winner, The Trial of the Chicago 7.
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2021: The Power of the Dog
Image Credit: Courtesy of KIRSTY GRIFFIN/NETFLIX Any of Being the Ricardos, West Side Story, CODA, or King Richard are defensible choices here. I lean towards the best director winner with four acting nominations, while noting the asterisk that the same lack of a SAG ensemble nomination that doomed it for best picture might have also spelled defeat for best casting.
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2022: Everything Everywhere All at Once
Image Credit: Courtesy of A24 / Courtesy Everett Collection This is the most surefire winner of the 21st century thus far. And no, that’s not recency bias. Everything Everywhere won three acting Oscars, had a strong supporting cast, and was beloved by the Academy. It’s a no-doubter.
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2023: Oppenheimer
Image Credit: Melinda Sue Gordon/Universal Pictures Perhaps this is premature to make any pick at all. It seems probable that either Oppenheimer (the SAG ensemble winner) or The Holdovers (the BAFTA winner for their new best casting award) is going to win two acting Oscars, depending on which film takes best actor. Whichever one does might have also been the frontrunner had best casting been introduced just a couple years earlier.
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And that’s a wrap: Since the entire point of adding a best casting Academy Award category is to give casting directors their due, this article ought to do the same. If all of the results listed here had actually come to pass, we would have a whole new set of Oscar legends in the record books. Juliet Taylor dominates this list with six wins, followed by three apiece for Ellen Chenoweth, Francine Maisler, Lynn Stalmaster, and Sarah Halley Finn. Back in the real world, Stalmaster remains the only casting director to win an Oscar, an honorary award granted in 2016. Fortunately, that’s about to change in just two years.
Ben Zauzmer is a contributing writer for The Hollywood Reporter and the author of Oscarmetrics: The Math Behind the Biggest Night in Hollywood.