‘Midnight in Paris’ and ‘The Descendants’ Win Writers Guild Awards
The Writers Guild of America have announced the 2011 winners for outstanding achievement in writing and they are exactly who you would expect at this late-stage of awards season. Pete Hammond reports that Woody Allen won the award for Best Original Screenplay for Midnight In Paris while Alexander Payne and Nat Faxon & Jim Rash took home the award for Best Adapted Screenplay for The Descendants.
The WGA certainly cements the Oscar case for each writer-director in their respective category and while it’s still possible that The Artist could beat out Midnight in Paris next Sunday night, I would think the Academy will reward a script from the well-respected Allen over a screenplay from a silent film.
The other nominees in Original Screenplay were 50/50, by Will Reiser; Bridesmaids, by Annie Mumolo & Kristen Wiig; Win Win, by Tom McCarthy; Young Adult, by Diablo Cody.
The other Adapted Screenplay nominees were Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, by Steven Zaillian, based on the novel by Stieg Larsson; The Help, by Tate Taylor, based on the novel by Kathryn Stockett; Hugo, by John Logan, based on the book “The Invention of Hugo Cabret” by Brian Selznick; Moneyball, by Steven Zaillian and Aaron Sorkin, based on the book by Michael Lewis.
MOTION PICTURE WINNERS
ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
- Midnight in Paris, Written by Woody Allen (Sony Pictures Classics)
ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
- The Descendants, Screenplay by Alexander Payne and Nat Faxon & Jim Rash; Based on the novel by Kaui Hart Hemmings (Fox Searchlight)
DOCUMENTARY SCREENPLAY
- Better This World, Written by Katie Galloway & Kelly Duane de la Vega (Loteria Films)
8 Comments
Most certainly should be the first time since 2005 that the Best Picture winner doesn’t take screenplay as well, when Sideways beat out Million Dollar Baby.
Interesting fact Red… And then The Artist sweeps it all!
I think The Descendants’ script is really good, I suppose this is the one category The Artist won’t be the top dog, ahah.
Yea Payne has a knack for writing these kind of stories.
I still think Moneyball has a good shot at taking home Adapted Screenplay, but they probably will give something to The Descendants and since Dujardin seems to be the frontrunner for Actor, this is the most likely candidate.
Now this just stymied my Oscar poll for Adapted Screenplay dammit!!
Really? I don’t see it as likely, from previous indications since both the screenplay and movie have won no awards of consequence so far.
There’s a part of me that would love it if The Artist won screenplay, specifically so they could talk about how screenplays are so much more than just “dialogue”. But I suspect that the combination of silent, along with competing against the Academy’s favorite Woody Allen, in one of the best films he’s done in a long time, will just be too much.
Yea it would definitely make it more interesting but as you stated, somewhat doubtful with Woody in the running
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