Oscars 2021: live blog and full list of winners at the 93rd Academy Awards
Welcome to Oscars night! Follow along here as Peter Coutu and I give our thoughts and reactions to the winners, losers, speeches, and everything in between. (Refresh to update.)
10:16 p.m.
JS: What a sour note to end the Oscars on. I think everyone expected a Boseman win, and it leaves the show with a real miss to close the evening. At least we didn’t have a speech apologizing to Boseman, because Hopkins didn’t show up.
PC: Yes, what an odd dud to end a 3-hour marathon on. Just left feeling a bit incomplete. Anyway, I’m signing off. It’s 11:17 out in beautiful Norfolk, VA.
JS: As always, after a triumphant moment, the Oscars finds a way to disappoint. Thanks to Peter for playing along. Hopefully we don’t tie again next year when Dune takes home Best Picture.
10:14 p.m.
JS: McDormand with the win, and Peter and I tie. But I’m happy! It was by far the best performance of the field. A brief speech—she does not give a fuck. Oscars royalty with three wins.
10:07 p.m.
JS: Nomadland takes Best Picture. It was the heaviest favorite in eight years, so no surprise here. It’s also one of the most deserving Best Picture winners ever. Just a brilliant, brilliant movie.
PC: One of the most deserving Best Picture winners ever?? Quite the claim.
JS: Was that the most brief Best Picture presentation ever? Lightning quick!
PC: We finally got some adequate clips, at least!
10 p.m.
JS: Picture before actors????? What is happening!!!
PC: This is madness. Do they want to end on something for Boseman?
JS: Ahhhhh. How right you are. Good call.
9:55 p.m.
JS: Cut the In Memoriam segment from the ceremony. Not sorry. Not only does it drag down the show, you’re always going to leave important people out.
PC: I couldn’t agree more.
9:53 p.m.
JS: An update on the predictions: we are tied, so whoever gets Best Actress right is going to win our game. Exciting!
9:52 p.m.
PC: It should be against the law—and carry a lengthy prison term—for companies to show the same commercial this many times one night.
9:50 p.m.
PC: Now this looks awesome.
JS: Also had a chance to see Summer of Soul via Sundance earlier this year. It’s incredible. Amazing concert scenes over and over and over. Can’t wait to see again. Questlove is a great director.
9:46 p.m.
JS: Glenn Close with the absolute win of the night. My God.
PC: Was that scripted? That must’ve been scripted.
JS: I really couldn’t tell. But I choose to believe it wasn’t.
9:44 p.m.
JS: This trivia game is a chaotic choice, but it’s kind of fun. Andra Day is a star.
PC: God, he’s so cool.
9:37 p.m.
PC: Big category. Huge. Need a win.
JS: Lamest song of the bunch wins! What the hell, man? Justice for Husavik. Speak Now was better too. H.E.R. was invented by the industry for the purpose of awards shows.
PC: This is tough to stomach. No reason this should’ve won.
9:34 p.m.
JS: Soul takes score. Shoutout to the great Jon Batiste! What a film.
9:23 p.m.
JS: TWO humanitarian awards during the broadcast?? A Tyler Perry montage??? No thank you! Speed it up.
PC: Do we think this ends by 11?
JS: Well it will definitely end by 11 for me. Eastern timers stink!
PC: Eastern time zone is by far the worst time zone.
JS: You try to go about your business, watch a basketball game, and it goes past midnight? Insanity.
9:17 p.m.
JS: Harrison Ford absolutely shitting on editors before the editing award. Classic.
PC: No matter the industry, everyone hates editors.
JS: True!
JS: Sound of Metal takes the editing award, and Peter and I are once again tied. Bummer!
PC: I said it wasn’t even close!
9:13 p.m.
JS: As Peter requested, our current prediction count: Jake 13, Peter 12.
JS: In the Heights looks amazing!!!
PC: I’ll tune in.
9:08 p.m.
PC: what’s the score now? You should have programmed something to keep a live tally for everyone following at home.
JS: I should have. The people are really invested in our contest! Mank with the upset win for cinematography. Well deserved.
9:05 p.m.
PC: If we’re being honest, I’m a little sleepy.
JS: Peter is such an old, old man. A win for the underrated Mank!
PC: How does anyone like Mank??
JS: Some of us have an appreciation for expert production design.
8:55 p.m.
JS: Yuh-Jung Youn for Supporting Actress. A nice performance! But I would have loved to see a Bakalova win. Thankfully, we get this great speech.
PC: A lovely speech!
JS: She’s a treasure.
8:53 p.m.
JS: Tenet wins an Oscar!
PC: A fucking joke.
JS: An absolute masterpiece. Can’t wait to watch it again and again.
8:51 p.m.
JS: Steven Yeun can present every category, thanks.
8:46 p.m.
JS: 13 categories in, five Netflix wins so far. They’re the superpower now, outside of not winning Best Picture.
8:42 p.m.
JS: My Octopus Teacher takes documentary as expected. But Time should have been the winner. Seek it out on Amazon Prime if you haven’t seen it. An incredible movie. I haven’t seen My Octopus Teacher but it sounds too silly to be Best Documentary.
PC: I haven’t seen either of them!
8:39 p.m.
JS: Marlee Matlin looks amazing. Can’t wait to see her back here next year for CODA, which I saw at virtual Sundance earlier this year. Great movie! Coming to Apple TV+.
8:36 p.m.
JS: Another one we both got wrong: Colette takes documentary short. Shoutout to my brother, who told me to pick Colette. I ignored him. Sad.
PC: What a barn burner.
8:30 p.m.
PC: Jake are we tied?
JS: Yes. How about Questlove’s airhorns after the Soul win? Amazing. I think the biggest win of the ceremony so far is that no one is wearing a mask and it doesn’t feel that weird.
PC: It does feel weird. Plus i have seen a couple masks!
8:24 p.m.
JS: Reese Witherspoon needs to chill. Relax, dude.
PC: Can it, Jake.
PC: Another incredibly strong category!
JS: And the clips are back! Ok, I do like them. I take it all back. I know Soul is winning here, but let me just say that Onward was great too.
PC: Onward was so good! I’m a sucker for films focused on two brothers. Wolfwalkers too!
8:20 p.m.
PC: Have you seen these?
JS: None of ‘em. I’m honestly never interested in the shorts. I know you disagree.
PC: The shorts are always the strongest category. If Anything Happens I Love You is so incredible. Incredibly moving.
JS: I’m always a sucker for when someone thanks their spouse and then the spouse is in the crowd crying. Always good content.
8:19 p.m.
JS: Let me take that Apple TV+ commercial be the opportunity to say that Billie Eilish: The World’s a Little Blurry is the best movie I’ve seen this year. It’s amazing. Watch it!
8:14 p.m.
PC: Now those were outfits.
JS: Two Distant Strangers wins best short, and Peter and I both miss on this one. I have not seen the film but the idea of a Groundhog Day-style murder-by-police film sounds brutal. But I haven’t seen any of the shorts, so what do I know.
PC: I did see this!
JS: And?
PC: It was good, but I also think I saw the same idea in a TV show recently too? Maybe I’m mixing stuff up, but that knocked it down a bit for me. (Jake copy editing/censoring me, sad).
JS: Peter spelling censoring wrong originally, sad.
PC: I fixed it immediately!
8:08 p.m.
PC: You watching any good shows?
JS: Into season three of my Community rewatch. Blitzing through at an unhealthy pace. And dude! Ted Lasso back in July! Extremely hyped. Also, Riz Ahmed is a beautiful man.
PC: That he is. I’ve become addicted to Survivor and I think Invincible might be the greatest thing I’ve ever seen.
JS: Some of us have better taste than others, I guess!
PC: I can’t get enough of the betrayal!
8:04 p.m.
JS: An hour into the ceremony, we’ve done seven categories. We’re on pace for just over three hours. Let’s hope it doesn’t stretch any longer than that.
8:02 p.m.
JS: A historic win for Chloé Zhao winning Best Director. And very well deserved. A beautiful movie.
PC: I would agree, Jake. Your first good point in quite some time.
JS: “People are inherently good,” Zhao says. Matches the message of her movie. A tidy speech, and a great fit. Zhao rules!
7:59 p.m.
JS: Really feels like there’s a lack of music in this year’s ceremony. Lot of long monologuing.
7:58 p.m.
JS: Bong Joon-Ho with a super slick presentation for Best Director, with the return of his kickass translator. Shoutout to him for not flying to L.A. after winning Best Picture.
7:56 p.m.
JS: Peter: what’s your take on the lack of movie clips for the acting nominees? I’ve received some complaints about it from a former colleague of ours, but I don’t hate it at all. Celebrities are interesting to look at! You can watch the clips online. Our colleague has called this an “absolutely insane take.”
PC: I would first like to ask where is our former colleague? What could be more important than this? I am very, very disappointed.
But on to the topic. You are so incredibly wrong. I don’t know how. I want to see the clips here! There should be more clips than thank yous. There should be more clips than nearly anything else. Turn this thing into a fucking clip show.
JS: Our colleague is wasting away in the silly little state of Maryland. He says “no one has seen these movies.” Probably true! So go watch them, ya nerds.
PC: I’ll be waaaaay more likely to see a movie if I see a riveting clip! I won’t seek out a movie if there’s nothing memorable about it!
JS: Begrudgingly, I can see that.
7:51 p.m.
PC: I love Cranston.
JS: I like him too but he’s being way to actor-y. Also, why broadcast this self-promotional stuff? Stick to the categories!
7:46 p.m.
JS: Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom also takes costume design, and I have my first miss. Peter and I, sadly, are tied.
7:44 p.m.
PC: Too easy!
JS: If we’re going to get through the technical categories, we should at least get speeches as interesting as this one.
7:39 p.m.
JS: Extremely underwhelmed by the West Side Story trailer. Lame.
PC: I think trailers have gotten worse over time.
JS: 2010 was peak trailer era. The Social Network, Inception ... we were really living back then.
7:35 p.m.
JS: Daniel Kaluuya gives a wild shoutout to his parents for having sex! And it somehow wasn’t awful. The man kicks ass.
7:33 p.m.
PC: So easy.
JS: Daniel Kaluuya freaking rules. Even if this’t my favorite performance of his, I’m glad he’ll have the juice to keep making more movies.
PC: He should get whatever role he wants, really.
7:27 p.m.
JS: Straight into supporting actor! Wowza.
PC: What is this order??
JS: LaKeith Stanfield with THE most swagger of the ceremony.
PC: He’s so hot it is not real life.
JS: Meanwhile, Sacha Baron Cohen’s goofy ass in Australia. The man does not deserve national treasure Isla Fisher!
7:25 p.m.
PC: No thank yous! Speech started strong and now ... zzzzzzz.
JS: What if they submitted who they want to thank ahead of time? And it could scroll across the screen, like movie credits?
PC: That’s a very great idea.
7:23 p.m.
JS: Another Round wins International Feature as expected, and Laura Dern looks great announcing it.
7:20 p.m.
JS: A change from past ceremonies: starting off with a bunch of big categories right away. I guess to rope people in? Seems like it’ll make the middle a long journey through the technical categories.
PC: Yes, I might have to time a nap right for the middle snoozefest.
7:16 p.m.
JS: First commercial break. Very, very different feel so far. Visuals are strange, but at least it feels new. I sort of like it!
PC: Going pretty well so far, I’d say. Wonder how much a commercial costs this year.
JS: For these low-quality commercials, let’s hope it’s not too much. It’s really going to be a ton of Disney self-promotion every break.
7:15 p.m.
PC: We need to brainstorm a way to make these speeches more interesting. I propose that we ban thanking anyone.
JS: Finally a good idea from Peter. Everyone knows there are big teams that go into these things and we don’t care about any of them. I like the non-Zoom screen though!
7:11 p.m.
JS: Awkward broadcast so far. And we are blitzing through the screenplays right away!
7:08 p.m.
PC: Promising Young Woman!!! What a flick.
JS: Wait, what? Had no idea they were announcing the category? Bad cut.
PC: Original screenplay! First of many wins for PYM.
JS: Let’s hope not.
7:06 p.m.
PC: I wish they had masks, it would frankly be more fun.
JS: A supremely bad take. The whole point of having famous people on TV is seeing their stupid beautiful faces.
PC: I’m so pro-masks I might never stop wearing them.
7:02 p.m.
PC: I am excited! Another year, another win.
JS: Opening moments of the ceremony styled like a Steven Soderbergh heist movie. Soderbergh immediately making this thing 10,000x more interesting. I like it!
6:51 p.m.
JS: Well, we’re back. Everyone on the red carpet looks great, no one is wearing a mask, and no one remembers how to talk to each other. Are we excited?
Full List of Winners
Best Original Screenplay: Promising Young Woman
Best Adapted Screenplay: The Father
Best International Feature: Another Round
Best Supporting Actor: Daniel Kaluuya, Judas and the Black Messiah
Best Makeup and Hairstyling: Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
Best Costume Design: Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
Best Director: Chloé Zhao, Nomadland
Best Sound: Sound of Metal
Best Live Action Short Film: Two Distant Strangers
Best Animated Short Film: If Anything Happens I Love You
Best Animated Feature Film: Soul
Best Documentary Short Subject: Colette
Best Documentary Feature: My Octopus Teacher
Best Visual Effects: Tenet
Best Supporting Actress: Yuh-Jung Youn, Minari
Best Production Design: Mank
Best Cinematography: Mank
Best Editing: Sound of Metal
Best Score: Soul
Best Original Song: “Fight For You,” Judas and the Black Messiah
Best Picture: Nomadland
Best Actress: Frances McDormand, Nomadland
Best Actor: Anthony Hopkins, The Father