The Oscar nominations 2025 was revealed bright and early Thursday morning, with Spanish-language “Emilia Pérez” topping all nominees with 13, including best picture.
Karla Sofía Gascón, who plays the film’s title character, goes down in Oscar history as the first trans actress to be nominated. Coralie Fargeat is this year’s only woman to enter the male-dominated category of best director, for her body horror shocker “The Substance.”
Here are notable highlights from this year’s Oscar nominations.
Landmark Day for LGBTQ+ Community
Karla Sofía Gascón cements her place in Oscar history as the first out trans woman to land an acting nomination. The “Emilia Pérez” star, who earned a best actress nod, isn’t the first trans actor to be recognized by the Academy. Elliot Page, who came out as trans in 2020, was nominated for an Oscar for his lead role in “Juno” back in 2008.
Colman Domingo and Cynthia Erivo, who are both queer, each earn their second acting Oscar nominations. For Domingo, “Sing Sing” marks the nominations for Best Actor two years in a row after “Rustin.” For Erivo, “Wicked” is her second best actress nomination after she scored her first nod five years ago for playing Harriet Tubman in “Harriet.”
Crashing the Boys (Director) Club
In a category that often overlooks female directors, Coralie Fargeat becomes only the ninth woman in Oscar history to be nominated for Best Director. (Jane Campion was nominated twice, for “The Piano” and for “The Power of the Dog,” making Fargeat’s tenth re-nomination for a woman.)
Only three female directors have actually won: Campion in 2022 for “The Power of the Dog,” Chloé Zhao in 2021 for “Nomadland,” and Kathryn Bigelow breaking the glass ceiling in 2010 for “Zero Dark Thirty.”
With Fargeat’s re-nomination, “The Substance” The filmmaker — who also received an original screenplay nod — follows in the footsteps of “The Anatomy of a Fall” director Justine Triet’s nomination last year. Fargeat is competing against male directors Jacques Audiard (“Emilia Pérez”), Sean Baker (“Anora”), Brady Corbet (“The Brutalist”) and James Mangold (“A Complete Unknown”).
In the Best Picture category, the nomination for “The Substance” makes it the sixth year in a row that at least one nominee was directed by a woman.
Black Acting Nods Take a swim
Although it was a down year for black actor nominations compared to 2024, when five actors (Colman Domingo, Sterling K. Brown, Danielle Brooks, Jeffrey Wright and Da’Vine Joy Randolph) were recognized, there is still much to celebrate.
In addition to Domingo’s second straight Best Actor nomination (this time for the prison-set “Sing Sing”), “Wicked” star Cynthia Erivo, who earned her first Oscar nomination in 2020 for “Harriet,” becomes the second black actress ever to earn two Best Actress nods to Viola Davis. Zoe Saldaña, who has said she identifies as Black Latina, was also nominated.
Latinx actor Gain ground
Four Latinx actors are nominated this year in the Oscars’ acting categories, an improvement from the two (Colman Domingo and America Ferrera) who received last year. “Emilia Pérez” actress Zoë Saldaña, who is of Puerto Rican and Dominican descent, received her first career nod for her performance in the Spanish-language musical. (Her co-star Karla Sofía Gascón was born in Madrid and moved to Mexico more than 15 years ago. She has said she considers herself “Mexican by adoption.”)
Last year, Domingo became the first Afro-Latino to be nominated for Best Actor, and he’s back this year (for “Sing Sing”). Monica Barbaro, who is of partial Mexican and Nicaraguan descent, is nominated for the first time for her supporting role in the Bob Dylan film “A Complete Unknown.” Brazilian-born Fernanda Torres, who won the Golden Globe earlier this month, was nominated for her first Best Actress Oscar for “I’m Still Here.”
In another landmark, for the Asian community, Black Box Diaries director Shiori Ito became the first Japanese filmmaker ever to be nominated in the Best Documentary category.
The 97th Annual Academy Awards, hosted by Conan O’Brien, will take place at the Dolby Theater on Sunday, March 2 and will be televised live coast-to-coast at 4pm PT/7pm ET on ABC.
