The late Chadwick Boseman (Black Panther, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom) and British actress Carey Mulligan (An Education, Promising Young Women) are both favourites to win the Best Actor/Actress awards at this year’s Academy Awards.
Critics and betting sites around the world are tipping these two stars to take the top prizes with Bet365 Australia paying just $1.05 for Boseman to win and $1.72 for Mulligan to get her first Academy Award.
Chadwick Boseman, who rose to fame through his 2013 portrayal of Jackie Robison in 42 later went on to play other famous historical figures including singer James Brown in Get on Up (2014) and Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall in Marshall (2017).
Boseman’s infamy rose to new heights after he starred in the 2018 Marvel Blockbuster Black Panther where he earned the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture and a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture, all as the first black actor to headline in a Marvel film.
Boseman died in 2020 after a four-year battle with colon cancer, a condition he also kept private from fans and media alike.
MA RAINEY’S BLACK BOTTOM (2020) Chadwick Boseman as Levee. Cr. David Lee/NETFLIX
Before his death, Boseman went on to play Levee Green in the 2020 hit Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, for which he won a posthumous Golden Globe Award for Best Actor as well as receiving four nominations at the 27th Screen Actors Guild Awards.
Boseman’s acclaimed performance as well as his lasting impact on African American cinema is surely a catalyst for why his odds to win the Academy Award for Best Actor are so low.
Carey Mulligan, who came to the big screen as Kitty Bennet in Pride & Prejudice (2005), has received one nomination for an Academy Award before for her leading role in An Education (2009).
Despite losing out to Sandra Bullock in The Blind Side, Mulligan was nominated for and won numerous other awards including a BAFTA for Best Actress in a Leading Role, a British Independent Film Award for Best Actress and a Hollywood Film Award for Breakthrough Actress of the Year.
Mulligan went on to co-star in the 2011 action drama Drive, alongside Ryan Gosling and received a BAFTA nomination for Best Actress in a Supporting Role. The film also received a standing ovation at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival.
To date, Mulligan has also earned acclaim for performances in movies such as Never Let Me Go (2010), Shame (2011), The Great Gatsby (2013), Suffragete (2015) and more recently, Promising Young Women (2020).
Mulligan’s portrayal of Cassie Thomas in Promising Young Women has already earned her a Critics Choice Award for Best Actress, an AACTA for Best International Actress in a Leading Role and a Best Female Lead award at the Film Independent Spirt Awards.
She also has a variety of nominations such as Best Actress in Motion Picture – Drama at the Golden Globes and Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role at the Screen Actors Guild Awards.
Other actors and actresses given a chance of taking home Academy Awards this year at Bet365 include Anthony Hopkins for The Father ($9.00), Riz Ahmed for Sound of Metal ($15.00), Andra Day for The United Staes vs. Billie Holiday ($4.50) and Frances McDormand for Nomadland ($6.00).
Bozeman seems already concluded but is he winning because he died? Hope joying still a good performance but Ahmed.. Mulligan deserves it. Hoping she finally gets it.