The Best Actor award at the Oscars is going to be a barnburner. This year was filled with incredible lead performances from a wide variety of actors at different stages of their careers. Only one can win the award, as is the case every year, but this year seems particularly unfair with so many deserving candidates. The nominees have not been announced, but given the other awards shows and more, we have a good idea who’s going to be nominated, and it’s going to be unfair to several eventual losers.
2025 Best Actor Race is Going to Be Incredible
The following performances are strong candidates to get recognized by the Academy and be nominated for an Oscar (in no particular order):
- Michael B. Jordan, Sinners
- Leonardo DiCaprio, One Battle After Another
- Wagner Moura, The Secret Agent
- Jesse Plemons, Bugonia
- Ethan Hawke, Blue Moon
- Timothee Chalamet, Marty Supreme
- Joel Edgerton, Train Dreams
- Oscar Isaac, Frankenstein
Of course, there can only be five nominations, and Hawke, Chalamet, DiCaprio, Jordan, and Moura are currently the favorites to be nominated. This is highly disrespectful to Plemons, but I digress. Among those five, I would rank them this way (without having seen Moura’s performance in The Secret Agent or Hawke in Blue Moon yet, so those two have to be last):
- Timothee Chalamet, Marty Supreme
- Michael B. Jordan, Sinners
- Leonardo DiCaprio, One Battle After Another
- Ethan Hawke, Blue Moon
- Wagner Moura, The Secret Agent
The award is always unfair. There are five nominations every year, and each one has a legitimate claim as the best performance of the year. Only one can win, which leaves four on the outside that probably, in another universe, would’ve won. They all climbed the mountain, only for just one of them to actually reach the peak.
For example, how was the Academy supposed to pick between Brendan Fraser, Collin Farrell, and Austin Butler in 2022? What about Will Smith and Andrew Garfield in 2021? How about Gary Oldman, Timothee Chalamet, Daniel Day-Lewis, and Daniel Kaluuya in 2017 (what a year that was!)? There are so many other examples, and those are all recent. It’s never fair at all.
But in 2025, we have several really deserving candidates, and while my pick is Chalamet, it’s not an easy one. He is the one in all-out pursuit of a win here, and he’s the young actor who probably deserves one by now. The charismatic Jordan is in a similar standing, but this is easily career-defining work for him. He’s been fantastic in other roles, but this feels like his best chance at it.
DiCaprio is the acting titan who’s back with another classic performance. It’s probably not his absolute best, but it’s still fantastic. Hawke is one of his generation’s finest, and he doesn’t have an Oscar win yet. Moura is a little more unknown to wider audiences, but he won’t be for long.
It’s a melting pot of all different archetypes and career paths in 2025. One winner, four losers. Obviously, getting the nomination is a high honor, and many of them will win other awards. Those awards aren’t the Oscar for Best Actor, though. That’s the pinnacle, and there’s a real argument for every one of the five.
Conclusion
My prediction remains that Timothee Chalamet wins the award, but Leonardo DiCaprio is probably the favorite right now. The only one that would surprise me is Wagner Moura. Michael B. Jordan would also be a little bit of a surprise, but that’s because it seems like the Academy isn’t as moved by his incredible dual performance. Nevertheless, this has been an incredible year for acting.
