Hollywood is buzzing after Tuesday morning’s long-awaited Oscar nominations announcements, finally revealing who will be competing for an Academy Award on Feb. 26.
One of the biggest stories of the morning was the nominations haul scored by e-commerce giant Amazon and its streaming video arm, Amazon Studios. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences gave Amazon’s big Oscar contender, director Kenneth Lonergan’s devastating drama Manchester by the Sea, six total nominations on Tuesday. Manchester by the Sea, which Amazon co-distributed with indie studio Roadside Attractions, is nominated for Best Picture, while Lonergan is nominated in both the directing and original screenplay categories. Actors Casey Affleck, Michelle Williams, and Lucas Hedges all also scored acting category nods.
In total, Amazon (AMZN) has seven nominations, with the Iranian thriller The Salesman—which Amazon is distributing in the U.S.—up for Best Foreign Picture.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has made no secret about his desire to win an Academy Award—an accomplishment no streaming service has yet pulled off—and the company has spent a lot of money building out its portfolio of original feature films as it looks to compete with more traditional Hollywood studios. Last year, Amazon saw its Oscar hopes dashed after the company’s collaboration with director Spike Lee on the film Chi-Raq failed to garner any nominations. But Amazon also spent a reported $10 million on the distribution rights to Manchester by the Sea at last year’s Sundance Film Festival.
Shortly after the nominations were announced, Amazon Studios’ head of motion picture production Ted Hope posted a Tweet (TWTR) noting that Manchester by the Sea‘s nominations came exactly one year after Amazon acquired the film’s rights:
One year ago to the day: @AmazonStudios bought #ManchesterByTheSea @sundancefest
Today: it got 6 #OscarNoms— Ted Hope (@TedHope) January 24, 2017
(Amazon is also back at Sundance as we speak, and the company has already topped last year’s big purchase by spending a reported $12 million on the dramatic comedy The Big Sick, as well as another $6 million on a documentary about the band The Grateful Dead.)
Aside from Amazon’s big haul for Manchester by the Sea, some of the other biggest winners on Tuesday morning included La La Land (from Lionsgate and Summit Entertainment), as the revamp of modern musicals tied an all-time record with 14 total nominations, including for Best Picture. Another top Best Picture contender, Moonlight—indie studio A24’s coming-of-age story about a young gay black man—scored eight total nominations.
Meanwhile, Amazon’s streaming rival Netflix (NFLX) also walked away with a handful of Oscar nominations. The popular streaming site, which has previously been nominated in the documentary category, scored three nominations in total on Tuesday.
Netflix’s 13th—director Ava DuVernay’s (Selma) look at the history of racial inequality in the U.S.—earned a nomination for Best Documentary Feature. Additionally, two documentary shorts put out by Netflix—Extremis, about end-of-life care, and The White Helmets, about rescue workers in Syria and Turkey—are also nominated.
