Oscars milestones: Buckley and Arkapaw make history but Coogler misses out
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Actress Jessie Buckley and cinematographer Autumn Durald Arkapaw both made history at the Academy Awards on Sunday night, though director Ryan Coogler was deprived of a chance to enter the record books.
Buckley is the first person from Ireland to win the Oscar for best actress, for her role in the film Hamnet.
It means Irish performers have finally triumphed in all four of the Oscar acting categories – an achievement spread over seven decades.
Barry Fitzgerald got the ball rolling in 1945, winning the best supporting actor Oscar for his performance in the musical comedy Going My Way, while Brenda Fricker did likewise in the best supporting actress category in 1990, for her part in the biographical drama My Left Foot.
More recently, Cillian Murphy won best actor in 2024 for his role in Oppenheimer.
Meanwhile, Autumn Durald Arkapaw had already made Oscars history by becoming the first black woman to be nominated for best cinematography.
Her win on Sunday night makes history twice over, however.
She is not only the first ever black female to win the award, but also the first woman to take home the prize.
The first non-white man to win the Oscar for best cinematography was Peter Pau in 2001, for the film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
Ryan Coogler and Chloe Zhao were two of this year’s nominees for best director, for Sinners and Hamnet respectively.
A win for Coogler would have marked the first time a black director had received the award.
The first non-white person to win the Oscar for best director was Ang Lee in 2006, for Brokeback Mountain.
Conversely, a win for Zhao would have secured her the honour of being the first woman to receive the award twice, having previously been named best director in 2021 for her film Nomadland.
In the event, both missed out, with the award going to Paul Thomas Anderson for One Battle After Another.
Coogler did pick up the Oscar for best original screenplay for Sinners, making him only the second black person to receive this award, after Jordan Peele’s win in 2018 for Get Out.
Elsewhere, there was the first instance in more than a decade of an Oscar being tied between two winners.
The award for best live action short film jointly went to The Singers and Two People Exchanging Saliva.
The last time a tie occurred was in 2013, when the Oscar for best sound editing was shared by Paul N J Ottosson (for Zero Dark Thirty) and Per Hallberg and Karen Baker (Skyfall).
