What to Expect at the 89th Academy Awards

What to Expect at the 89th Academy Awards

January is swiftly drawing to a close, and that means we’re entering Oscar season! Just a few weeks remain until the 89th Academy Awards will air live from the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood. You can watch the ceremony from home by tuning in to ABC at 8:30 on Sunday, February 26—or, of course, you can always record it on your DVR since the complete ceremony will be around three hours long.

Jimmy Kimmel has been given the honor to host the event this time, and a slew of other celebrities will also make appearances to present each award. These are yet to be determined.

As far as the actual Oscars are concerned, nine films have been nominated for the biggest prize of the night—Best Picture. They are as follows:

Arrival
Fences
Hacksaw Ridge
Hell or High Water
Hidden Figures
La La Land
Lion
Manchester by the Sea
Moonlight

While Arrival boasts the highest box office performance ($95.7 million), La La Land will be the big name of the night, and its earnings will likely surpass those of Arrival in the coming weeks. The film has been nominated for 14 awards, making it the most-nominated film in Oscar history alongside the cinematic giants Titanic and All About Eve. It received nominations for 13 of the 17 categories for which it was eligible, including two nominations for Best Original Song:

• “Audition (The Fools Who Dream)” (La La Land)
• “Can’t Stop the Feeling!” (Trolls)
• “City of Stars” (La La Land)
• “The Empty Chair” (Jim: The James Foley Story)
• “How Far I’ll Go” (Moana)

As always, musical performances will be woven throughout the ceremony to highlight the nominees in this category. Performers will be announced in the near future.

Aside from La La Land, Arrival and Moonlight also managed to nab eight nominations, followed by Hacksaw Ridge, Lion, and Manchester by the Sea with six. You can expect these movies to be the night’s big winners.

On a lighter note, five films have been nominated for Best Animated Picture:

Kubo and the Two Strings
Moana
My Life as a Zucchini
The Red Turtle
Zootopia

Two actors and two actresses will also be awarded for their outstanding performances in this year’s films. The competition is as follows.

Best Actor:
• Casey Affleck (Manchester by the Sea)
• Andrew Garfield (Hacksaw Ridge)
• Ryan Gosling (La La Land)
• Viggo Mortensen (Captain Fantastic)
• Denzel Washington (Fences)

Rumor has it that Casey Affleck is the shoo-in for this award.

Best Actress:
• Isabelle Huppert (Elle)
• Ruth Negga (Loving)
• Natalie Portman (Jackie)
• Emma Stone (La La Land)
• Meryl Streep (Florence Foster Jenkins)

Meryl Streep currently holds the record for the most Academy Award nominations, and this is her 20th nomination.

Best Supporting Actress:
• Viola Davis (Fences)
• Naomie Harris (Moonlight)
• Nicole Kidman (Lion)
• Octavia Spencer (Hidden Figures)
• Michelle Williams (Manchester by the Sea)

This is the first time in Oscar history that three of the five nominees in an acting category have been non-white. Viola Davis is also the first black actress to be nominated three times.

Best Supporting Actor:
• Mahershala Ali (Moonlight)
• Jeff Bridges (Hell or High Water)
• Lucas Hedges (Manchester by the Sea)
• Dev Patel (Lion)
• Michael Shannon (Nocturnal Animals)

This is big news for Lucas Hedges, who is only 20 years old.

The full list of nominations can be found on the official Academy Award website (click here). The Red Carpet, for those who are interested, will more than likely start at 7:00 PM. Again, the ceremony will commence at 8:30 PM on Sunday, February 26.

Leonardo DiCaprio might have made waves last year with his first-ever (and long-awaited) Oscar win, but who knows? Something just as big could happen this time around. Titanic, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, and Ben-Hur each have won a record 11 Oscars in the past, and La La Land, thanks to its 14 nominations, has the potential to break this record and find a special place in Oscar history.

Regardless of what happens, though, the 89th Academy Awards ceremony is guaranteed to be a lot of fun.