Is This the Next Big Awards Show? Inside the 2024 Gotham Awards
’Tis the season—the 2024-2025 awards season, that is. As is tradition, The Gotham Film Media Institute ushered in the months-long red carpet bonanza that leads up to Oscars night with a star-studded celebration in Manhattan on Monday evening. The Gothams tipped the spotlight and handed the mic to breakthrough talent and Hollywood heavyweights alike, proving that independent storytelling is the important throughline that brings the entire industry together.
As black town cars snaked down Wall Street from 5.30 p.m., onlookers leaving the office craned their necks and did a double take inside the temporary tent popped up outside Cipriani. What could be bringing the likes of Zendaya, Angelina Jolie, Nicole Kidman, Pamela Anderson, Demi Moore, Colman Domingo, Saoirse Ronan, Timothée Chalamet, and many, many more to the Financial District on a Monday?! As the leafy-walled step and repeat looked like the IMDB homepage had come to life, leading ladies and gents didn’t seem at all phased by the frigid December temperatures as they gave us a sizzle reel of awards season fashion to come.
Elegant as always, Angelina Jolie was among one of the first to take to the stage, in an understated black silk dress with a handkerchief hem. Jolie was presented with the Performer Tribute for her turn as influential opera singer Maria Callas, in recognition of the seven months she spent learning the soprano’s songs. “It’s wonderful to be here in New York, where Maria was born and lived most of her life, on what would have been her 101st birthday,” Jolie said poignantly.
As Jolie returned to her table, her seatmate Azazel Jacobs congratulated and applauded her. Moments later, it would be his turn, as the His Three Daughters screenwriter was announced as the winner of Best Screenplay for his touching film in which Carrie Coon, Natasha Lyonne, and Elizabeth Olsen play estranged sisters caring for their sick father.
Josh O’Connor was on duty to present his Challengers castmate Zendaya with the Spotlight Tribute for her compelling role as Tashi Donaldson in the tennis flick. The actress notably knocked it out of the park time and time again during the press run for the film, and evidently is gearing up to continue the streak, opting for a slinky backless Louis Vuitton halter gown. “I’m going to get you back,” she jokingly told O’Connor after his sweet, sincere, and sentimental speech. “We hate giving each other compliments.”
While there was no shortage of bold-faced names awarded on the evening—including Timothée Chalamet and James Mangold for their collaboration on the upcoming Bob Dylan biopic, A Complete Unknown; Dune: Part Two director Denis Villeneuve; and the talented ensemble cast of The Piano Lesson—they shared well-deserved air time with first-timers and new kids on the block. Indian filmmaker Payal Kapadia received the award for Best International Feature for her debut All We Imagine as Light. Multi-hyphenate Vera Drew also received the Breakthrough Director win for the unconventional superhero parody, The People s Joker.
Breakthrough Performer winner Brandon Wilson of the Nickel Boys was most certainly dumbstruck over his win—he arrived on stage practically speechless and announced he had taken his shoes off earlier and forgotten to put them back on. Another person in disbelief was Aaron Schimberg, whose dark comedy A Different Man won for Best Feature Film. “I don’t think I’m the only person in this room who’s totally stunned...considering the other nominees, I thought it would be hubris to prepare a speech,” he said at the podium.
At no time was the recognition of emerging talent more emotive than when formerly incarcerated Sing Sing Correctional Facility inmate Clarence ‘Divine Eye’ Maclin was revealed as the winner of the Outstanding Supporting Performance category, in which he was up against stiff competition from Guy Pearce, Danielle Deadwyler, Kieran Culkin, and Natasha Lyonne, among others. As the room gave him a standing ovation for his performance in the film about the real-life Rehabilitation Through the Arts program he is an alumnus of, Maclin said: “If someone was to tell me that I’d be here ten years ago, you couldn’t make me believe it. I’d like to thank all the people who had the heart and the courage to believe that our story meant something and that our stories could contribute and help.”
If The Gothams are any indicator, A24’s Sing Sing is readying to sweep the boards across categories at ceremonies in the coming months. The picture was awarded the Social Justice Tribute, and actor Colman Domingo also received one of the evening’s biggest prizes: the coveted Outstanding Lead Performance nod. “This is for my colleagues at this table,” Domingo said, pointing to Maclin and his co-stars. “These men found art to be the parachute that could save them, they poured themselves into it, and it poured back into them. I’m truly grateful to do work like this; work that can make a difference in the world. This work is what we can do to keep light in the darkness. Hang on to that—as these men showed me that they did. It changed their lives, and they’ve changed mine.”
Producer Franklin Leonard, the founder and CEO of the industry resource The Black List, summarized the need for independent storytelling now more than ever while accepting The 2024 Anniversary Tribute Award. “The next twenty years, I think it’s safe to say, are going to be a little rough, but it will be more rough for the people who are not in this room. For those of us who are here, please look to those people, speak their names, tell their stories, and better yet, give them a platform to tell their stories.”
Jason Crowley/BFA.com1/37Zendaya, Denis Villeneuve, Jake Gyllenhaal
Jason Crowley/BFA.com2/37Angelina Jolie