The 30th Annual Screen Actor Guild Awards, also known as the SAG Awards, took place on Saturday, Feb. 24 at the Shrine Auditorium & Expo Hall in Los Angeles. The show honored the profession of acting, with winners chosen by the votes of guild members which include: 160,000 actors, announcers, broadcast journalists, stunt performers, voiceover artists and other screen experts.
This year’s award ceremony was more significant than the past years because it was the first leading SAG event since the actors’ protest came to a close in November. A deal with the Guild went through in December, ending a four-month nightmare that shut down movies and TV shows within the industry.
With the exception of the 2017 – 2019 ceremonies, the SAG Awards hasn’t had a committed host. Long-time producer Kathy Cornell explained why back in 2013.
“We chose to not have a host because we didn’t want the time taken away from the people we were honoring. Our show is just two hours long. We wanted the whole evening to be about the actors and not about one personality,” Cornell said. This year, however, “Queer Eye’s” Tan France and Elaine Welteroth, former editor-in-chief of Teen Vogue, were the hosts for this year’s pre-show red carpet.
Viewers were able to stream the ceremony live on Netflix. It will be their first time airing the show since the studio obtained the rights in 2023. Prior to Netflix, it had been on TBS and TNT, but when Netflix started to engage in more live programs in 2023, the awards categories was one of the initial signings. France and Welteroth’s pre-show red carpet was on Netflix as well as Youtube and TikTok.
It came as no surprise that Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” and Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” were tied for the most nominations, taking home the main awards for its cast and individual male actors. As far as TV shows, “Succession,” “The Bear,” and “Beef” once again added to their plethora of awards.
Alex Birk, a junior majoring in Media Studies, says that it makes sense to her that both Oppenheimer and Barbie were tied for receiving the same nominations — “both movies were hyped and compared together,” Birk said.
When asked which she would see again, she says, “I would choose ‘Oppenheimer’ and ‘The Bear.’ I really liked ‘The Bear’ especially because I like food so it’s interesting seeing what it’s like behind the scenes. Honestly, ‘The Bear’ and ‘Oppenheimer’ are both behind the scenes and I thought it was cool.”
Lily Gladstone made history by being the first indigenous actress to win the award for Best Actress for her role as Molly Kyle in “Killers of the Flower Moon.” When accepting her award, Gladstone said, “We bring empathy into a world that needs it,” encouraging other actors to “keep speaking your truth.”
The cast of HBO’s “Succession” was named Best Ensemble in a Drama Series for successfully pulling off their final season of familial power-grabbing and back-stabbing, while FX’s “The Bear,” a pressure-cooker look at restaurant life, earned a Best Comedy Series Ensemble Prize. “Beef” co-stars Ali Wong and Steven Yeun won the top acting awards for a TV movie or limited series.
Some other key winners were: Da’Vine Joy Randolph’s Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role for “The Holdovers.” “The Last of Us” star Pedro Pascal won for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series. Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series went to Elizabeth Debicki who played Princess Diana in “The Crown.”
Another award that “The Last of Us” won was Outstanding Action Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in a Television Series. “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One” made its way in the winner circle for its victory in the category of Outstanding Action Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in Motion Picture.
