2025 Oscars slugfest: Five top experts clash predicting Best Supporting Actor/Actress [Watch]

Is so-called “category fraud” taking over the Best Supporting Actress race at the upcoming Oscars? Is Kieran Culkin really on track to win Best Supporting Actor for “A Real Pain”?

Five top Oscar experts from major media outlets recently got together to dish these two supporting contests: Gold Derby’s Debra Birnbaum, Deadline’s Pete Hammond, Variety’s Clayton Davis, The Hollywood Reporter’s Scott Feinberg, and Indiewire’s Anne Thompson. Watch their 2025 Oscars slugfest video above.

“Supporting actress is a very tough category this year, because we have some movies that are going to provide two,” Hammond says in reference to “Emilia Pérez’s” Zoe Saldaña and Selena Gomez. He adds that “Zoe is probably the frontrunner as we speak because, really, it’s a leading role.”

“Wicked” scene-stealer Ariana Grande is also a leading role campaigning in supporting, and she continues to climb up Gold Derby’s charts. “Who saw that one coming?” Birnbaum wonders aloud. But is it category fraud? “It’s strategy,” she declares, as the group ponders the fates of Danielle Deadwyler (“The Piano Lesson”) and Saoirse Ronan (“Blitz”).

Davis predicts Isabella Rossellini (“Conclave”) could be a “sneaky, sneaky winner” based on her seven-minute, 51-second performance. “She deserves it, [and she’s] never been nominated,” he reminds viewers. Other short performances that prevailed include Judi Dench in “Shakespeare in Love” (1998), Beatrice Straight in “Network” (1976), and Ingrid Bergman, aka Rossellini’s own mother, in “Murder on the Orient Express” (1974).

Moving over to the supporting actor race, Thompson confirms that Culkin is still “leading the category” for her. More top choices that will “absolutely” get in are Denzel Washington (“Gladiator II”), Edward Norton (“A Complete Unknown”), and Guy Pearce (“The Brutalist”). Finally, a nom for Yura Borisov (“Anora”) “could happen,” she notes, because “people fall in love with him.”

Feinberg mentions “Conclave’s” Stanley Tucci and John Lithgow, “Anora’s” Borisov and Mark Eydelshteyn, and “September 5’s” Peter Sarsgaard and John Magaro as films that have multiple contenders in this category. “That’s gonna be their biggest problem as individuals,” he states. After all, how will the voters ever “pick” between them?

SIGN UP for Gold Derby’s free newsletter with latest predictions