Behind the scenes with the very best actor Oscar nominees on the 2025 Academy Awards

Watch scenes from the performances nominated within the class of greatest actor on the 97th annual Academy Awards, in addition to interviews with the nominees under. The 2025 Oscars might be introduced on Sunday, March 2.

Adrien Brody, “The Brutalist”  

In 2003 Adrien Brody grew to become the youngest greatest actor Oscar-winner in historical past for his efficiency in Roman Polanski’s “The Pianist,” as Wladyslaw Szpilman, a musician struggling to outlive within the Jewish ghetto throughout the Nazi occupation of Poland. It was a job for which he just about starved himself, dropping 30 kilos, all whereas studying the piano in order that he may play Chopin.

Twenty-two years later, Brody is again along with his second Oscar nomination for “The Brutalist,” Brady Corbet’s lacerating story of László Tóth, a Hungarian Jewish architect who emigrates to the US, and his efforts each to renew his profession and to assimilate in a society the place antisemitism and classism are rife.

Tóth is employed by a rich Pennsylvania industrialist to construct a large group heart in his “brutalist” type – a type of structure that is mild on ornament and heavy on concrete. On this scene, Tóth – who’s working a development website in Pennsylvania – is found by Harrison Lee Van Buren (greatest supporting actor nominee Man Pearce), who sees in Tóth a expertise for which he needs to be the patron.

Tóth accepts a fee. However as soon as his spouse Erzsébet (greatest supporting actress nominee Felicity Jones) arrives from Europe, Tóth  feels caught between his inventive impulses and the realities of working in an America that, in lots of instances, is closed to the international born:

Brody, whose mom and grandparents fled Hungary throughout the 1956 revolution, mentioned their sacrifices knowledgeable his efficiency. “There was a lot unknown, and plenty of loss,” he informed “Sunday Morning.” “And all of these sacrifices have sort of laid the muse for my very own existence and what has been accessible to me.”

He additionally heard the voice of his Hungarian grandfather in Tóth. “I keep in mind my grandfather’s accent was very, very heavy,” he mentioned. “I conjure it up. I additionally knew each unhealthy phrase in Hungarian as a child. So, I infused a few of that in it that is not within the script!”

On this prolonged interview with “Sunday Morning,” Brody believes that empathy helped form his personal decisions as an actor, “looking for movies which have social relevance, or to characterize individuals who haven’t got a voice and to offer them that by means of me in some respect.”

Brody received the New York Movie Critics Circle Award, the Golden Globe for greatest movement image actor (drama), and the BAFTA for “The Brutalist.” The movie acquired 10 Oscar nominations, together with greatest image and greatest director (Brady Corbet).

“The Brutalist,” launched by A24, is enjoying in choose theaters in 70mm, and is offered through VOD.

Timothée Chalamet, “A Full Unknown” 

Timothée Chalamet earned his first greatest actor Oscar nomination at age 22 for “Name Me By Your Title,” as a teenage boy who turns into the goal of an older man. In “A Full Unknown,” Chalamet performs the long-lasting singer-songwriter Bob Dylan throughout the years when he made a reputation for himself as a people artist and as a rock star who, to a phase of his followers, left the roots of folks music behind.

On this scene Dylan is launched by Pete Seeger (greatest supporting actor nominee Edward Norton) for his first look at New York’s Folks Metropolis, the place he performs “I Was Younger After I Left Dwelling”:

Previous to capturing, Chalamet travelled to Minnesota to analysis Dylan’s roots and his formative days. He returned to the state for a screening of the completed movie in Minneapolis. In December Chalamet informed CBS Minnesota station WCCO, “I feel he is very happy with his Minnesota heritage, and I feel, in some methods, the way in which I relate to him is, I feel the iron ore in his songs and the iron ore in his voice — as a New Yorker, as a 28-year-old New Yorker, I do not suppose my path would have actually introduced me out right here, ever.

“So, the primary time I received right here I assumed, ‘Wow, what a present, Bob Dylan, being on this man’s worldview.'”  

The actor was first connected to the undertaking in 2019, however capturing was repeatedly delayed on account of COVID after which the actors’ strike. Within the intervening years, Chalamet discovered how you can play the guitar. “I do not know if I am going to ever get this a lot time to work on one thing upfront,” he informed The Hollywood Reporter. He additionally gained 20 kilos previous to capturing, to higher match the folks singer’s physique.

He mentioned the function marked the furthest that he’d stretched himself. “And it grew to become so biblical to me when it comes to this man’s life and his work that I felt if I let my focus err for a second, that I would be self-loathing about it for years to come back. I had three months to play Bob Dylan, and the remainder of my life I do not get to be about that, so why not give it my all?”

To attach with what the reclusive Dylan represented, the actor informed “60 Minutes” he disconnected from his personal life for the two-and-a-half months of filming. He didn’t use his cellphone, or have guests on set. “I’ve by no means approached a personality so intensely as Bob, ‘trigger I’ve such respect for the fabric,” Chalamet mentioned. “And I knew I would not have the ability to stay with myself if I remembered that I used to be lazy on a day when one thing went mistaken.”

Along with studying how you can play the guitar and the harmonica, the actor informed “60 Minutes” he discovered to carry out about 40 Bob Dylan songs — excess of have been initially referred to as for within the script. However whereas Chalamet pre-recorded all of the Dylan songs he’d sing within the film (to be performed again on set throughout filming), he mentioned they sounded “too clear,” and so he tried performing stay on set, doing so the primary time in a scene by which Dylan visits his terminally unwell hero, people artist Woody Guthrie, in a New Jersey hospital.

Director James Mangold mentioned he knew Chalamet nailed “Tune to Woody” on his first take: “There is a second in that scene proper on the final stanza the place he holds a be aware – that will by no means have occurred if we might used the playback observe,” Mangold mentioned.

Chalamet additionally examined video of the singer, together with footage taken of a Dylan performing a duet of “It Ain’t Me Babe” with Joan Baez, which he performed at a lowered velocity. “That was after I actually slowed down, ‘trigger it is fascinating the way in which Bob observes her,” he mentioned. “And the way he refuses eye contact in that video.”

In “A Full Unknown,” Chalamet and Barbaro carry out “It Ain’t Me Babe”:  

Talking of the completed movie, Chalamet mentioned, “I used to be honored and counting my fortunate stars that we received to carry this to life. As a result of nothing’s a given. No alternative is a given. No profession is a given. I talked rather a lot about this with Edward Norton: the present to work on one thing the place every single day — whether or not listening to the musicians we have been enjoying, or the musicians that impressed them, or studying the authors that impressed them — you study extra about your self.”

Chalamet informed “60 Minutes” he is unsure what he’d say to Dylan if he ever did meet him – however possibly not even point out the film, and solely discuss in regards to the climate: “What his favourite sandwich is, or one thing like that … I’d play it tremendous cool, you understand? ‘Trigger I really feel like he is most likely used to a lot hyperbole and reward.”

Chalamet received the Display Actors Guild Award for his efficiency. 

Nominated for 8 Academy Awards, “A Full Unknown,” launched by Searchlight Photos, is enjoying in theaters. and is offered through VOD.

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Colman Domingo, “Sing Sing”  

At New York’s Sing Sing jail, the group Rehabilitation By the Arts, or RTA, was shaped to provide performs that includes incarcerated males performing classics by Shakespeare, in addition to authentic performs that spoke to the lived experiences of males.  The worth of theater as a software of reform was made palpable by RTA’s success; in comparison with the jail’s typical recidivism fee of 60%, solely 3% of former inmates who had taken half in RTA have been again in jail three years or much less after their launch.

Directed by Greg Kwedar, the movie “Sing Sing” was constructed on the experiences of real-life former inmates (two of whom, Clarence Maclin and John Divine G Whitfield, share an Oscar nomination for greatest tailored screenplay). Colman Domingo was nominated for taking part in Divine G, a founding member of Sing Sing’s theater program and an award-winning writer.

On this scene, Divine G attends a clemency listening to and describes to the commissioners how the jail program grew into one thing he calls “great”:

Domingo was a journeyman actor whose work in recent times has exploded, from “Worry the Strolling Lifeless” and “Euphoria,” to “The Colour Purple” and “The Insanity.” He acquired two Tony Award nominations (for performing within the musical “The Scottsboro Boys” and producing the play “Fats Ham”). He earned his first Oscar nomination final yr for taking part in civil rights activist Bayard Rustin in “Rustin.”  

He talked about his current success on “CBS Mornings” final November: “I really feel that it has been a very long time in my journey, the place out of the blue the roles are kind of assembly my talent set and what I am interested by and what I can do. So, it simply appears like I am a journeyman actor. I have been working for 34 years, and it simply appears like, I by no means knew what this time could be like.”

Final March, on the day of the Oscars, Domingo posted an image of himself on Instagram as a toddler, writing, “His dream got here true. Not simply. With dedication, laborious work, hardships, triumphs, pitfalls, detours, reroutes and love and religion. In the present day is an efficient day for this child. He already received. And as you’ll be able to inform he at all times cherished a pop of shade. Bought it from his mother and father.”

That “pop of shade” led to Domingo being requested by Anna Wintour to co-chair the 2025 Met Gala. “She really mentioned, ‘I am unsure in the event you’d be concerned about one thing like this or when you have time,'” Domingo laughed. “I mentioned, ‘I feel I’ve time!'”

“Sing Sing,” launched by A24, is offered on VOD.

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Ralph Fiennes, “Conclave”  

Within the thriller “Conclave,” based mostly on Robert Harris’ novel, Ralph Fiennes performs a Vatican insider tasked with working the gathering of the Faculty of Cardinals in Rome to pick out a brand new pope. As Cardinal Thomas Lawrence, Fiennes navigates the intrigue of papal politics, a reluctant participant consumed with doubt.

On this scene, Lawrence offers a sermon in regards to the energy of uncertainty in religion.

“I like characters which have contradictions inside them,” Fiennes informed “Sunday Morning.” His response to studying the a part of Lawrence was, “Oh, I really like this. It is a human. He isn’t a saint. He is a superb man looking for his manner.

“I used to be introduced up a Catholic after which rebelled after I was 13,” Fiennes mentioned. “My mom was a dedicated Catholic. So, ‘God questions’ have been in my household since I used to be a toddler.”

And did he come away with any solutions to his personal questions? “No, I got here away with extra questions,” he mentioned.

Fiennes was nominated for an Oscar twice earlier than, for “Schindler’s Record” and “The English Affected person.” His efficiency in “Conclave” additionally earned him Golden Globe, Display Actors Guild and BAFTA nominations.

“Conclave” is enjoying in theaters and is offered through VOD.

Sebastian Stan, “The Apprentice”

In “The Apprentice,” set in Seventies and ’80s New York Metropolis, a younger Donald Trump, attempting to take cost of his father’s actual property enterprise, comes below the tutelage of Roy Cohn, a infamous attorney-fixer, who instructs Trump on how you can promote himself within the media. Cohn’s dictum:  Assault, assault, assault. Deny, deny, deny. By no means admit defeat … classes that Trump would carry by means of in his enterprise profession, social media projections and, later, political branding.

On this scene, Trump (greatest actor nominee Sebastian Stan) tries to promote himself to a newspaper reporter, utilizing the motivation of Cohn (greatest supporting actor nominee Jeremy Robust) to not-quite-successful impact. It is clear he has a methods to go…

The movie, written by journalist Gabriel Sherman and directed by Ali Abbasi, premiered finally yr’s Cannes Movie Pageant. Whereas it acquired vital reward, potential movie distributors shied away after the Trump marketing campaign threatened to sue. The film was in the end picked up by Briarcliff Leisure and launched shortly earlier than the 2024 presidential election.

In an look final October on “CBS Mornings,” Stan (whose credit embrace “Gossip Lady,” “I, Tonya,” “Pam & Tommy,” and enjoying Bucky Barnes in Marvel’s Captain America franchise), admitted that he’d been warned by some to avoid the undertaking, particularly as a result of it could possibly be seen as a political third rail. 

“Yeah, it is normally after I hear ‘Do not do it,’ I find yourself doing it!” he laughed. “However usually talking, I feel concern ought to inspire us to enter the storm, not run away from it.

“Persons are going to come back into the movie with plenty of baggage, plenty of projections [about Trump],” he mentioned. “However I feel attempting to strip away all of the noise and getting all the way down to the fundamentals — what’s the emotional want? What’s the drive? What was the potential of the person, and the place did it find yourself? How did all of it get to this at the moment? And I feel there’s nonetheless worth in understanding that.

“I feel the movie’s about belief,” mentioned Stan. “I feel we’ve a possibility to have a look at these individuals and genuinely ask ourselves, can we belief them? Can we use our human intuition relatively than what we’re being informed to suppose, really feel, and perceive? Can we use our intuition to belief these individuals as we’re going ahead into the longer term?”

That is Stan’s first Academy Award nomination. He acquired Golden Globe and BAFTA nominations for his “Apprentice” efficiency as properly. This yr he additionally acquired a Golden Globe nomination for his efficiency in “A Completely different Man.”

“The Apprentice,” nominated for 2 Oscars, is offered through VOD.

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