"[Bias] is that thing that stops you being regarded as a person and makes you something smaller. With my accent, I've had that experience where I'm suddenly no longer a person with infinite possibilities and potential - I am 'that Scottish person'. I'm reduced to a noise that comes out of my mouth."
Paul Dano has responded to Quentin Tarantino's scathing criticism of his acting abilities, thanking those who came to his defence after Tarantino called him a weak, uninteresting guy and the limpest dick in the world. On Wednesday, Dano told Variety that the supportive responses that poured in from his peers and across social media was touching. That was really nice, Dano said. I was also incredibly grateful that the world spoke up for me so I didn't have to.
For the first time since the advent of the Animated Feature category in 2002, the Oscars have a new trophy: It's the award for Achievement in Casting, which will have two years as the Academy's shiny new toy until the Best Stunts Oscar comes along to steal its thunder in 2028. Since it's never existed before, the Casting Oscar was the subject of much pre-nomination scuttlebutt. Would this be yet another craft category that would be entirely filled with Best Picture nominees?
The Welsh-born actor had spent much of the decade living in the United States, where he split his time between the stage and the screen, building an utterly respectable career. He had played a compassionate doctor in David Lynch's The Elephant Man, a murderous ventriloquist in the cult thriller Magic, and the real-life convicted child murderer Bruno Hauptmann in the TV movie The Lindbergh Kidnapping Case, for which he had won his first Emmy.