To Leslie heads back to theaters following Andrea Riseborough’s surprise Oscar nomination
The low-key indie film provided one of yesterday's biggest shocks as this year's Academy Awards contenders were announced
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Following Andrea Riseborough’s shocking Oscar nomination for her performance in To Leslie, which initially made $27,000 during its quiet theatrical run last fall, the film will be heading back to cinemas now that there is renewed interest in the project. According to The Hollywood Reporter, it will be rereleased in “approximately six” locations across North America, followed by additional theaters in the UK.
While the top Oscars contenders are typically promoting their work for months ahead of awards season, the English-born Birdman actor only began campaigning in earnest weeks ago, just as voting for the nominations began. Word-of-mouth support and social posts from Hollywood stars such as Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Minnie Driver, and Demi Moore cropped up seemingly overnight, and it was enough to score Riseborough a slot during yesterday’s announcement of this year’s nominees. To Leslie’s recognition may be a win for low-key releases that don’t have huge awards budgets behind them, but the campaign has also been criticized for seemingly interfering with Viola Davis and Danielle Deadwyler’s chances at making the cut.
Directed by Michael Morris, To Leslie follows Riseborough as a Texan single mother and onetime lottery winner struggling to reconnect with her son. The film was distributed by Momentum Pictures, which co-star Marc Maron slammed for “gross incompetence” in playing the awards game. (In the infinite multiverse, somewhere out there is a timeline where Gwyneth Paltrow and Edward Norton rallied to get Aubrey Plaza an Oscar nomination for Black Bear.)
While The Hollywood Reporter does not mention where the handful of theaters To Leslie is being rereleased in are, more people will soon get to decide for themselves whether it’s a small film with a giant heart on the big screen.
8 Comments
I was just talking to my wife about how wonderful she was in Possessor and Mandy. I look forward to seeing this and I’m sure she deserves it.
Ok, someone explain the blowback to her nomination as if I were a five year old. Because from what I’ve read, it’s fucking stupid. Does not every movie and actor campaign for the award? What’s the charge against her here? That there was a conspiracy among white voters to shut out two Black actors at the last minute by giving her the nom? How many thousands of voters are there in the acting branch that decides these things? You’re telling me they all conspired to nominate this woman because they didn’t want two Black women? When we have Angela Bassett nominated? How is that even entertained as an idea? And why is she responsible for two different people not getting nominated? Why not blame Michelle Williams, Michelle Yeoh, Ana de Armas, and Cate Blanchett for taking a nomination that should have gone to two actresses? Two actresses among many more who did stellar work this year, and guess what, were also not nominated for an Oscar. Come on, people, you’re smarter than this.
The gripe isn’t that she specifically did anything too snub two Black actresses from a nomination. It’s that it’s a gross usage of Hollywood networking (in my neck of the woods it’s called “The Good Ol’ Boys” network) that often that doesn’t work for people of color. It’s the same as the son of a donor getting in to college or the nephew of the CEO getting a plum job. It’s what people tend to think affirmative action is but much more prominent. I don’t have any gripe against Riseborough, specifically, but the fact is that 99% of prognosticators did not have this performance anywhere on the radar until celebrities started tweeting about it. It’s a movie that nobody has even seen let alone talked about, compared to Danielle Deadwyler (who won a Gotham Award best actress over Blanchette and Yeoh and male actors) and Viola Davis (in a popular film). It’s just emblematic of how the world works for white people in general; it’s not just this stupid awards show.
Then how do you explain the nomination for Brian Tyree Henry? His performance also wasn’t “on the radar” either, yet he managed to snag a well deserved nomination nonetheless. Nobody was talking about Causeway, not even a consideration for Jennifer Lawrence. Who pushed for him to get a nomination? Maybe just consider that both Andrea and Brian were too talented to ignore.
I’d argue that I see no difference between a regular Oscar campaign for any and all Oscars that have been given out since the beginning, and whatever campaign Riseborough’s fellow actors did. I assumed all nominees benefit from word of mouth, and since the Academy is only filled with people from the film industry, that politicking is done only by famous, powerful people, since there’s no one else in that group. I hadn’t thought she might have benefited from a word of mouth campaign over a similarly situated Black actress. I would assume the latter also have their networks too and can spread word of mouth. But how we would find out one wouldn’t have worked more than the other because of race? The criticism against this nomination, to me, is too vague.
Indeed. Danielle Deadwyler maybe doesn’t have the connections. But Viola Davis (1 Oscar win + 3 more nominations, lead in numerous TV programs and movies) is less connected in Hollywood than Andrea Riseborough? That belies belief.
Andrea Riseborough was not nominated for a Golden Globe, Critics Choice, SAG or Gotham Awards yet she get nominated for an Oscar! Really???
Gross. This will leave a stain on her career.