Academy Awards to add category for casting directors, so let’s get one for stunt performers next

The Academy Of Motion Picture Arts And Sciences has generally showed some willingness to change with the times, like when it expanded the number of Best Picture nominees from five to 10 after The Dark Knight failed to secure a nomination despite being The Big Movie that year, or like last year when it decided that streaming movies have to actually play in theaters outside of New York and Los Angeles. And today, the Motion Picture Academy has decided to grow a little by adding a long-demanded category for casting directors—the first new category since Best Animated Feature Film was added more than 20 years ago.

Variety says that this change will take effect with the 98th Academy Awards, which is happening in 2026 and will apply to movies from 2025. People in Hollywood have been fighting for this to happen since the ‘90s, but Variety says there wasn’t “widespread support” for a casting Oscar at the time. That has evidently changed now (to quote a common refrain from this year’s Oscar critics, Barbie didn’t cast itself), and this move is very welcome, long overdue, and what seems like an easy decision.

After all, casting is an aspect of filmmaking that is pretty straightforward for people on the outside of the industry: Did someone do a good job choosing which actors should be in this movie? If so, it has good casting. Easy!

But, at the same time, if the Academy is willing to add categories, could we also finally get one for stunt performers? John Wick series director Chad Stahelski (who got his start doing stunts) has been campaigning for that for a long time, saying just last year that the stunt team is “as relevant as any department,” adding, “I’m gonna be a little arrogant and say I think we’d add a little something to the Oscars. It’s a legitimate win-win situation.”

Academy CEO Bill Kramer said that casting directors “play an essential role in filmmaking,” and it should be hard to argue that the same isn’t true for stunt performers. Detractors might argue that not every movie has stunt performers, but that just means a category like this would force the Oscars to consider things that aren’t normally considered—which is to say movies that have cool stunts, which have been a hallmark of movies since they were invented.

So yes, casting directors deserve Oscars, this is cool and good. And stunt performers also deserve Oscars, so they should do that next.