SAG Awards 2024: The Night Is Dominated by “Oppenheimer”

Robert Downey Jr. and Cillian Murphy, who starred in the movie, won awards for their individual performances. Moreover, Lily Gladstone and Da’Vine Joy Randolph triumphed(SAG Awards 2024).

At Saturday night’s 30th Screen Actors Guild Awards, Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” took home three major victories, boosting its already impressive haul of industry honors.

Cast members Emily Blunt, Robert Downey Jr., and Cillian Murphy took the stage to accept the SAG Award for outstanding ensemble, the film’s highest accolade. When they last appeared together, in July, at the biopic’s premiere, they protested in support of the SAG-AFTRA strike, as their co-star Kenneth Branagh pointed out.

For us, this completes the cycle, said Branagh.

“Oppenheimer” is regarded as the front-runner for the best picture Oscar after taking home the top honors at the Critics Choice, BAFTA, and Golden Globes thus far. Only five of the previous ten ensemble winners have gone on to win an Oscar, including “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” which won best picture last year.

Given that the winners of the SAG Awards have precisely mirrored the Oscars for the past two years, they have a far superior track record of elucidating the various acting races. Murphy, who starred in “Oppenheimer,” beat out Paul Giamatti (“The Holdovers”) and Bradley Cooper (“Maestro”) in the fierce competition for best actor. Murphy was recognized for his portrayal of physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer.

Lily Gladstone, who starred in “Killers of the Flower Moon,” received the SAG award for her portrayal of an Osage woman whose family members are killed by her husband (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his uncle (Robert De Niro), despite Emma Stone, the heroine of “Poor Things,” winning the BAFTA for best actress last weekend.

SAG recognized Downey, who gave a fiery performance as a political operator in “Oppenheimer,” and Da’Vine Joy Randolph, who portrayed a bereaved school chef in “The Holdovers,” in the supporting races. Both performers have been outstanding this season and will most likely win big on Oscar night.

“Why now, and why me? Why does it appear like I’m winning? In his most recent victory speech, Downey made light of the situation and said, “Unlike my fellow nominees, I will never grow tired from the sound of my voice.”

Randolph aimed to uplift her fellow performers in her own remarks.

“How fortunate are we to do what we do?” she questioned. “Let me tell you, every actor out there waiting for their chance—your life can change in the course of a single day.”

Barbra Streisand appeared to make a reference to the state of the world as she won a lifetime achievement award during the program. She remarked, “Now I dream of a world where such prejudice is a thing of the past,” pointing out that studio executives like Louis B. Mayer and Samuel Goldwyn fled antisemitism in Eastern Europe and went on to build Hollywood.

The singer, actor, and director, however, mostly discussed her passion for movies, remembering with nostalgia how she used to attend to the movies at a theater close to Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn. She explained why she didn’t enjoy reality by saying, “That make-believe world was much more pleasant than anything I experienced.” “I aspired to star in motion pictures.”

She later noted, as a working actor, that Harry Stradling, the cinematographer, and William Wyler, the director, had created the foundation for her career with their first picture, “Funny Girl” (1968). She said, “They had no issue with opinionated young women.”

The full list of SAG awards may be seen here.