But those are far from the only headwinds facing the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. Last year’s Oscars, held in late April at an audience-less Union Station rather than the Oscars’ usual home, the Dolby Theatre, plummeted to an all-time low of 9.85 million viewers.
Can Tuesday’s slate of nominees stem the tide? Among the films expected to do well are Denis Villeneuve’s sci-fi epic “Dune,” Kenneth Branagh’s autobiographical coming-of-age tale “Belfast” and Jane Campion’s gothic western “The Power of the Dog. Alas, “Jackass Forever,” the current no. 1 movie at the box office, will have to wait until next year.
Here are five questions heading into nominations.
JUST HOW MUCH WILL STREAMERS DOMINATE?
Streaming services have for years made inroads into the Oscars, but they may overwhelm this year’s best-picture field. After academy rule changes, 10 films will be nominated for best picture, and it’s possible that only a few of them will have opened traditionally in theaters. Netflix, which is still pursuing its first best-picture trophy, has three contenders in “The Power of the Dog,” Adam McKay’s apocalyptic comedy “Don’t Look Up” and Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musical adaptation “Tick, Tick … Boom!” Apple has the deaf family drama “CODA” and Joel Coen’s Shakespeare adaptation “The Tragedy of Macbeth.” Amazon is represented with Aaron Sorkin’s “Being the Ricardos.” Two films that premiered simultaneously in theaters and on HBO Max — “Dune” and the Will Smith-led “King Richard’ — are in the hunt. That has made contenders like Paul Thomas Anderson’s “Licorice Pizza” (MGM, Focus Features) and “Belfast” (Focus) stand out as theater-first throwbacks.
WILL THE BIGGEST BOX-OFFICE HITS CRASH THE PARTY?
Given the waning audience for the Oscars and a tumultuous year for theaters, some would like to see as many crowd-pleasers represented Tuesday as possible. Could “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” the biggest hit of the pandemic with $749 million in domestic ticket sales and $1.77 billion globally, or Daniel Craig’s 007 swan song “No Time to Die” ($774 million worldwide) score a best picture nomination? As much as the Oscars’ populism could use some pop, don’t count on either to join the 10 nominees. The segment of the academy most supportive of big-budget box-office success — producers — passed up the chance to in their highly predictive guild nominations. That would likely leave “Dune” ($399 million worldwide) as the category’s biggest ticket seller. But there are also other metrics to measure today’s most popular movies. “Don’t Look Up” is Netflix’s second-most popular movie ever with some 359,790,000 hours watched, according to the company.