I finally had some time for contemplation after working off the hangover from last Sunday’s miserable Oscar telecast. The show was so bad (did Franco really walk out in drag?!) that copious amounts of Jim Beam were employed, and by the time Jeff Bridges made it on stage to present the Best Actress Award I was inspired and switched to mixing Caucasians to finish the night. The Kahlua abides.
With residual anger I gradually got around to pondering what all the panegyrics truly meant. We have been led to believe what an import The Oscar represents, and how it transforms the life of the performer who is granted this high honor. But does it really? I decided to reach back and study the after affects. I began from the 68th Academy Awards, in 1996, through to the 80th Awards in 2008 and weighed the ensuing performances of the four thespians feted with Oscars each year in order to determine if they in fact enjoyed a career elevated into the stratosphere, or if they were more likely to disappoint.
To begin, of the roughly fifty actors looked at I removed five from consideration: Michael Cain, Morgan Freeman, Jack Nicholson, and Denzel Washington all have had lengthy and successful careers before and after winning, and thus no appreciable impact would be found. The fifth, James Coburn, won at the end of his lengthy career and passed away not long after.
The remaining names are then judged based on the work they produced after their Oscar performance and placed into one of three career classifications; Good, Mitigated (little or moderate change), and Bad. What is most revealing here is that not only is there a smaller number than expected who continue with solid filmographies, but also the large amount of middling to Bad careers that followed a win — many times immediately after they had been awarded. The list below contains the performer, the title for which they won an Oscar, and the titles they went on to produce following their triumph.
The Good
Javier Bardem (No Country For Old Men) – He is a perennial nominee it seems. After winning we saw Love in the time of Cholera, Vicky Christina Barcelona, and he was nominated again for Biutiful. However, there is also Eat Pray Love. Be careful, hombre!
Cate Blanchett (The Aviator) – Her career is filled with mostly good ideas, both prior and post-Oscar win. The only smudge might be Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull.
Chris Cooper (Adaptation) – He continued with his career as a beyond-solid character actor, including an arch turn in The Bourne Identity for popularity points.
Russell Crowe (Gladiator) – Mostly decent roles in decent films, with two additional nominations following.
Judi Dench (Shakespeare In Love) – The always quality work from her continued as she was nominated four additional times, as well as entering the James Bond Universe.
Frances McDormand (Fargo) – Has been nominated twice since her win, and continued making quality appearances in films by her husband, Joel Cohen.
Sean Penn (Mystic River) – Mostly solid roles followed, including another Oscar win for Milk.
Geoffrey Rush (Shine) – He made a name for himself stateside with this victory and has gone on to earn three more nominations, including this year for The King’s Speech.
Tilda Swinton (Charlie Wilson’s War) – The quirky British actress manages to draw quality scripts, or at least give a decent run in movies like Julia, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, Burn After Reading, and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
The Mitigated
Kim Basinger (L.A. Confidential) – Somewhat a surprising win, and she has all but disappeared since winning.
Juliette Binoche (The English Patient) – Following her triumph the French actress has mostly worked in her homeland. Another appearance, in Chocolat is her lone standout afterwards.
Jim Broadbent (Iris) – British character actor with a mass of work that had no effect on his career, good or bad.
George Clooney (Syrianna) – A perfect mixed bag. For every Michael Clayton, or Up In the Air he also gave us Leatherheads and The Men Who Stare at Goats.
Jennifer Connelly (A Beautiful Mind) – Her Oscar has not exactly elevated things. She followed with The Hulk, and then mostly found supporting roles.
Marion Cotillard (Le Vie En Rose) – The French actress may yet become a larger name. So far she has only made Public Enemies, and Nine.
Benicio del Toro (Traffic) – He’s had a mostly unusual career to begin with, and he has continued to turn in both good, and odd performances. Nothing monumental.
Nicole Kidman (The Hours) – Good ideas like The Human Stain, and Cold Mountain get balanced out by dogs such as The Stepford Wives and Bewitched.
Gwenyth Paltrow (Shakespeare in Love) – She has given a few good roles occasionally, a few appearances in disasters (Duets, or Up in the Air) and basically now is currying favor with audiences by appearing in Iron Man and Glee.
Tim Robbins (Mystic River) – He has had an extremely light workload after winning his Award. War of the Worlds is probably his most notable role since.
Susan Sarandon (Dead Man Walking) – After the gripping role of a nun servicing death-row inmates she, much like her longtime lover Tim Robbins, has not offered up anything substantial since.
Phillip Seymour Hoffman (Capote) – Mostly mild performances in indies, or character roles; but then he did follow his win by playing the heavy in Mission Impossible 3.
Kevin Spacey (The Usual Suspects) – While yes, he went on to win another trophy (for American Beauty) that was followed up with things like The Big Kahuna, Ordinary Decent Criminal, Pay it Forward, and K-Pax, and Fred Clause. So essentially it is a “push”.
Hilary Swank (Boy’s Don’t Cry) –similar to Spacey, with the stinkers like The Core and Amelia polluting her filmography, but she did manage to go on and win another statue for Million Dollar Baby.
Charlize Theron (Monster) – Mostly moderate roles since winning, some good (North Country) and some bad (Aeon Flux).
Catherine Zeta-Jones (Chicago) – Largely unremarkable work since winning.
The Bad
Alan Arkin (Little Miss Sunshine) – The Supporting Actor win could have capped off a lengthy career, but he has continued with choices like Firewall, and The Santa Clause 3.
Roberto Benigni (Life is Beautiful) – The only other notice the Italian actor received in America has been the reviled Pinocchio.
Halle Berry (Monster’s Ball) – Catwoman. Nothing else has to be said, simply Catwoman. Have I mentioned Catwoman?
Adrien Brody (The Pianist) – Has done little with his recognition. This was immediately followed by The Singing Detective, The Villiage, and The Jacket. Currently he is either known as the lounge singer in Stella Artois commercials, or the guy who nailed the bald human-mutation in Splice.
Nicolas Cage (Leaving Las Vegas) – He may actually have bested (“worsted”?) Cuba Gooding. His next three films in order were, The Rock, Con Air and Face/Off, and with the exception of only a few bright spots his career has largely been one of self-parody.
Daniel Day Lewis (There Will Be Blood) – Likely to change, yet all we have seen thus far is the disappointing Nine.
Jaime Foxx (Ray) – It was a well-earned Oscar, but next he did Stealth which un-earned a massive $100 million. Then came Jarhead, and Miami Vice.
Marcia Gay Harden (Pollack) – Her win did nothing to improve her standing in films, and even without outright bombs against her name she has begun to do more work in TV in the past few years.
Cuba Gooding Jr. (Jerry MacGuire) – The fool’s-gold-standard of dismal post-Oscar careers. He began nicely with As Good As it Gets, but soon lapsed into dreadful titles, such as What Dreams May Come, Chill Factor, Snow Dogs and Pearl Harbor. His appearance in Boat Trip alone would be cause for the Academy to rescind his trophy.
Jennifer Hudson (Dreamgirls) – Mostly a win for her singing, but her next role was thankless as Carrie Bradshaw’s assistant in Sex and the City is not a positive. Then she did the tepid The Secret Life of Bees.
Helen Hunt (As Good As it Gets) – She immediately worked with Dr. T and the Women, and then Pay it Forward. Then, after an anonymous role in Castaway, she next had What Women Want. Not much of note since.
Angelina Jolie (Girl, Interrupted) – Immediately after her win we got Gone in 60 Seconds, and then Lara Croft: Tomb Raider. She has turned in mostly light roles and action-movies; nothing Oscar-worthy since.
Hellen Mirren (The Queen) – Most feel she will turn things back to the positive, but before the winning Red she settled with National Treasure: Book of Secrets, Inkheart, and State of Play.
Julia Roberts (Erin Brockovitch) – Many expected this to lead to a renewed career for her, but instead she has seemed mostly apathetic. Her next role was in The Mexican and she has not impressed with anything hence. Since her last two titles have been Valentines Day, and Eat,Pray,Love it does not look to change.
Mira Sorvino (Mighty Aphrodite) – She surprised many by winning in Woody Allen’s lightly seen production, and then could not come close to impressing. When Mimic and The Replacement Killers are your later high-points it is a bad sign.
Rachel Weisz (The Constant Gardener) – Has not done much with her clout. My Blueberry Nights, voiced in Eragon, and then there’s Fred Clause.
Forrest Whitaker (The Last King of Scotland) – Going for the Cuba Gooding effect. The Ripple Effect went straight to video, and then he did Vantage Point, and Street Kings. Then he really dropped by doing Repo Men, Powder Blue, and Our Family Wedding.
Robin Williams (Good Will Hunting) – His next four titles were What Dreams May Come, Patch Adams, Jakob the Liar, and Bicentennial Man. Wow. He briefly had some impressive turns (in One Hour Photo, and Insomnia) but he quickly reverted back to crap, with Death to Smoochie, RV, Man of the Year, and License to Wed.
Reese Witherspoon (Walk the Line) – The ghost-romance story Just Like Heaven was weak, then came the disappointing Rendition, and the holiday dirge Four Christmases.
Renee Zellwegger (Cold Mountain) – She was opposite – but unremarkable – Russel Crowe in Cinderella Man, but then mostly duds and flops were all she managed. A Bridget Jones sequel, Leatherheads, New in Town, My One and Only, and Case 39 impressed nobody.
So the tally is jarring to see. Of the 45 listed here less than ¼ can be deemed impressive, with an overwhelming amount being average to far worse. What makes this all the more surprising is we have been conditioned to accept it as high quality, especially when films get promoted with taglines announcing how Oscar royalty will be appearing on screen. Conversely, this also becomes an indicator of when a particular actor’s career has hit the skids, when the accolade is no longer mentioned. This past weekend, for example, I saw few ads for Drive Angry mentioning it stars “Oscar Winner” Nic Cage.
21 comments
“The French actress may yet become a larger name. So far she has only made Public Enemies, and Nine.”——Really? I guess “Inception” doesn’t count? This list is alllllllllllll over the place. There are people in the “Bad” section, lots of them, who have had their greatest commercial successes (like Cage) after the Oscar win and continue to be more successful than winners in the first 2 sections. There are also people under “Bad” who didn’t seem to have ANY notoriety whatsoever until their Oscar win (like Brody), and regardless of how successful their films have been, continue to work in big films and have had substantially more success post-Oscar than before.
In Brad’s defense, he did qualify the reasons for the actors being in the “Bad” category was the caliber of performances post-Oscar. That said, I’m not sure that’s the best barometer for how the Oscar affects the actors’ careers. Cage, Jolie, and Witherspoon are all $20+ million-per-movie actors who are marquee names, some of the biggest stars in Hollywood. To me that has to be a factor in how the actor’s career went post-Oscar.
This is a pretty subjective list… you leave out “Inception” for Marion Cotillard, which could be argued as she really doesn’t have a large role, but then you forget that Nicholas Cage made “Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans”…? So I’m not sure what your criteria are based on, the size of the role, the critical success, or merely the commercial success? You’ve made filmography selections here that seem to suggest an agenda, or pretty narrow screening habits. For instance, Rachel Weisz delivered a great performance in “Agora”…regardless of its other qualities and lack of commercial impact.
I thought Cate Blanchett emerged from that Crystal clusterfuck with a good deal more dignity than the majority of the other players, having injected some wry humor into a one-note, one-dimensional “character” and obviously having a whale of a time in the process. As for Marion Cotillard, her roster of French film is huge, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she were happy to continue in that vein. I’ve been championing her ever since Taxi, so both her Oscar and current in-demand status is particularly pleasing. Lastly, Stealth was utter shit.
Didn’t Tilda Swinton win the Oscar for Michael Clayton?
Brad Slager, an actor’s career is always haphazard pre or post Oscar win. You should have made your list on DIRECTORS. Much jucier. For example, Peter Jackson went downhill fast after winning the Oscar with King Kong and Lovely Bones. Steven Spielberg arguably hasn’t made a great film since winning the statue. James Cameron only made one film since winning it, but it was his worst (Avatar). All in all, the longer someone like Chris Nolan goes without winning it, the better it is for the quality of his films.
Interesting list. Its sad seeing all of these winners going on to make crappy movies. At least there are a few who maintain the image!
You forgot Jeremy Irons, whose post-“Reversal of Fortune” work has varied from mildly interesting (M Butterfly, Lolita) to absolute fucking dreck (The Time Machine, Eragon).
I also noticed that when he says something like “and then he followed it up with…”, they are often films that were already in the can at the time they won the Oscar. In some cases, the Oscar-winning film may have been made AFTER the lesser movie. The timeline gets all screwy.
Stealth was a nuclear powered turd. So much so it was sitting on a shelf for a few years before Foxx won his Oscar for Ray.
Interesting article, but have to agree that the criteria for post-Oscar career success are extremely confused and fucked up.
Daniel Day Lewis bad? I would have left him out since he has been nominated 3 times after his first Oscar win. Plus, he has only made 9 movies since the first Oscar win….in 1990. I think you need to employ some sort of math equation to include frequency of movies post win as well. If anything, I would put him in the Good section because he hasn’t followed up an Oscar win with just pure trash like the other people in this section.
*Additional negative sentiments towards specific examples on this list*
Most of them have been covered, more to be…I’ll leave it to the angrier chewers.
Yeah, this list is all over the place. I can’t even begin to figure out what criteria you were using to sort these people. Also, you labeled “Death To Smoochy” as crap, which I simply will not abide.
I feel like being a jerk, so…do Philip Seymour Hoffman’s two oscar noms for best supporting actor in 2008 and 2009 not count as success in any way?
This list is totally retarded…after touting, in the intro, the long history of nominees to analyze, he sticks mostly to the last decade. And totally ignores prior wins by Penn and Day Lewis, among others, placing them in the ‘bad’ or ‘middling’ category, despite the fact that they’ve won before, been nominated before, and choose to act very rarely in–by and large–incredible movies.
On the other hand, if Brad is 12, this is great work, and I look forward to more in about a decade.
Also, chud totally sucks without Devin.
Anyone who lists Death to Smoochy as a black mark on Robin Williams’ record hasn’t seen the movie. It didn’t have any commercial success, but it is EXACTLY the kind of comedic role that I wish Williams would go back to on a more consistent basis.
To explain for some: I chose to go back one decade in order to see a contemporary result, not to mention combing through the entire history of Oscar winners might be book length. (Also why I never mentioned “the long history”, as had been accused.) I was analyzing the post Oscar careers, thus while some did have good/decent performances I measured the body of work. Such was the case with Nic Cage (whom I even qualified with “bright spots” mentioned) who cannot be said to have seen his career blossom.
As for defending Williams with “Death to Smoochie”, even if you want to call that a decent film (which I do not) there are still seven other examples I gave to keep him in that category.
I did not tout such in the intro, AND Penn was placed in the Good cat. by the way, so you may want to revise your critique. Lewis had his win mentioned in the last ten years, thus ranked as the others had been judged.
This article is not up to the level that I have expected from this site in the past. In one case “up in the air” is great, but bad on another? This article needs ritalin.
On Nic Cage – “His next three films in order were, The Rock, Con Air and Face/Off.” And that’s a bad thing? Compared to what he’s making these days, that’s the golden era of Nicolas Cage!
I also noticed on this list (whether it was good, bad, or in between) that there are quite a few actors on here that are pretty much untouchable. Actors like Clooney, Crowe, Roberts, and even Jolie have all had successful careers and will still have their hits and other good films whether the author thinks they acted well or not. For a lot of the bigger names on this list, winning an Oscar was just something ELSE that they’ve done. It’s nice that they got one, but their careers weren’t necessarily defined by it.
Comments are shown as archived from the original site; new comments are closed.