NC native Ariana DeBose grabs Oscar nomination. How a win could make history.
North Carolina native Ariana DeBose is poised to make history.
The triple-threat actress-singer-dancer who grew up in Raleigh and Wake Forest was nominated Tuesday for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Steven Spielberg’s “West Side Story.”
If she wins, she’ll be the first queer woman of color to take the prize. It would also be only the third time that an actor won an Oscar for playing the same character that a different actor also won for.
DeBose, 31, plays Anita in the 2021 remake, the same part that won an Oscar for Rita Moreno in the 1961 film by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins. That film adaptation of the original 1957 stage production (with music by Leonard Bernstein and lyrics by Steven Sondheim) won 10 Academy Awards. Moreno was the first Latina woman to win an Oscar.
Spielberg’s “West Side Story” got seven nominations overall, including Best Picture and Best Director, along with nods for Cinematography, Costume Design, Sound and Production Design.
The movie’s nomination for Costume Design goes to UNC School of the Arts graduate Paul Tazewell.
You can see the full list of 2022 Oscar nominations at oscars.org.
DeBose has already won Golden Globe, Los Angeles Film Critics and NY Film Critics awards for the part, and has been nominated for Screen Actors Guild, Critics Choice, BAFTA and NAACP awards, among others (those results are pending).
All of this puts DeBose — fresh off of an outstanding turn hosting “Saturday Night Live” in January — in a good position to win the Oscar, and many pundits have picked her as a frontrunner. But she has very strong competition from her fellow nominees. Kirsten Dunst in “Power of the Dog,” Jesse Buckley in “The Lost Daughter,” Judi Dench in “Belfast” and Aunjanue Ellis in “King Richard.”
In January, Vanity Fair’s assessment had DeBose “comfortably out front.”
The 2022 Oscars ceremony airs on ABC on March 27.
DeBose was built for ‘West Side Story’ role
When “West Side Story” premiered in December, critics praised DeBose’s work.
Entertainment Weekly called her Anita “a pure dopamine rush on the dance floor and a small revelation off of it, dimensional and fiercely tender beneath her brash exterior.”
The New York Times review said: “It helps that Alvarez, Faist and — supremely — DeBose are such magnetic performers. When DeBose is onscreen, nothing else matters but what Anita is feeling.”
And in Variety: “It’s hard to overpraise Ariana DeBose, whose Anita is the wounded soul of the film. She has the best lines, dances and sings with so much passion that the screen can hardly contain her.”
The News & Observer interviewed DeBose in December when “West Side Story” premiered. (She was also The News & Observer’s Tar Heel of the Month in March 2021.)
“Anita is one of the greatest roles ever written in the musical theater canon,” DeBose told The N&O in December.
“It’s a triple-threat role and it’s exactly what I am built to do. That’s exactly what my training and skill set has gifted me, so it’s a role I had always hoped I’d get a chance to play. ... I certainly never thought that I’d end up in a Spielberg film, but it was definitely a bucket list role.”
DeBose is also known for her work on Broadway as The Bullet in “Hamilton” and for “Summer: The Donna Summer Musical,” for which she was nominated for a Tony Award. Over the past year, she has starred in Ryan Murphy’s Netflix movie “The Prom” and in the Apple TV+ musical comedy series, “Schmigadoon.”
In her December interview, DeBose was asked whether her mother, Gina DeBose, a teacher at Wakefield Middle School in Raleigh, might accompany her to the Oscar ceremony if she’s nominated.
“I’m assuming she would take off work to come to the Oscars with me, if that is a thing that happens,” DeBose said. “Who knows. Can you imagine Gina DeBose on a red carpet? I can. I think it will be fun.”
Ariana DeBose 2022 awards watch
Here’s a scorecard of DeBose’s 2022 awards season, so far.
▪ Los Angeles Film Critics Award? WINNER: The winners were announced on Dec. 18, and DeBose picked up Best Supporting Actress honors for “West Side Story.”
▪ Golden Globe Award? WINNER: DeBose was nominated for and won Best Supporting Actress honors from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association on Jan. 9. The winners were announced in the Beverly Hilton ballroom with no nominees or winners present. It was not televised or even streamed.
DeBose tweeted her appreciation, while also acknowledging recent HFPA scandals: “There is still work to be done, but when you’ve worked so hard on a project — infused with blood, sweat, tears and love — having the work seen and acknowledged is always going to be special. Thank you.”
▪ Critics Choice Awards? NOMINATED/POSTPONED: These awards were originally scheduled to be handed out on Jan. 9, the same evening as the Golden Globes (DeBose was also nominated for Best Supporting Actress here), but the ceremony has been postponed, because of COVID. We’ll update when we know more.
▪ Screen Actors Guild Awards? NOMINATED: DeBose was announced as a nominee in the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role category on Jan. 12. Screen Actors Guild will announce winners during a broadcast on TNT and TBS on Feb. 27.
▪ NAACP Image Awards? NOMINATED: Nominees were announced on Jan. 18 and DeBose was nominated in the category of Outstanding Breakthrough Performance in a Motion Picture. The winners will be broadcast Feb. 26 on BET. The NAACP Image awards celebrate the achievements and performances of people of color across categories including film, television and streaming, music and literature.
▪ BAFTA Awards? NOMINATED: The British Academy of Film and Television Arts nominated DeBose in the Best Supporting Actress category and for the Rising Star award. The ceremony is scheduled for March 13.
This story was originally published February 8, 2022 at 8:21 AM.
