‘Sing Sing’ Takes the Gotham Awards By Storm

“No matter where you start, you should always be able to dream of where you can go and be,” said an emotional Sean Dino Johnson, the formerly incarcerated actor turned recipient of a social justice tribute award Monday night. The air was full of possibility at the 34th annual Gotham Awards that evening, where Colman Domingo and the cast of Sing Sing got a second wind in the awards race; Nickel Boys made a big splash; and a surprise best feature win for A Different Man shook up an already crowded awards season.

Held at Cipriani Wall Street, the Gotham Awards saw Hollywood’s A-list convene to celebrate the best in independent cinema from 2024. Nominees like Nicole Kidman and Demi Moore mingled with their fellow stars, while Jessica Chastain and Zendaya slipped in right before the ceremony began. The only thing you couldn’t find on the list of nominees were big-budget blockbusters like Wicked and Gladiator II. In years past, the Gothams only nominated films with budgets below $35 million; although the cap was lifted in 2023, smaller films still reigned supreme at the ceremony and with the small juries who decided each category, panels that included actors, filmmakers, and past winners like Greta Lee, Oscar Isaac, and Julia Stiles.

My Old Ass stars Aubrey Plaza and Maisey Stella kicked off the festivities onstage, riffing on their film’s title. (“Everywhere I go, people want to talk to me about my old ass,” deadpanned Plaza.) The first award of the night, best screenplay, went to Azazel Jacobs for His Three Daughters, which follows three estranged sisters who come together to care for their ailing father. One of the sisters, Natasha Lyonne, leapt to her feet to celebrate the writer and director, who thanked the Gothams for honoring his very personal film.

The first of a handful of non-competitive tribute awards went to Angelina Jolie for her work transforming into opera legend Maria Callas for Pablo Larrain‘s biopic Maria. “She’s an angel to this film,” said Larrain as he introduced Jolie. Accepting the award on what would have been Callas’s 101st birthday, Jolie regaled the audience with an anecdote about how her mother stored their overflowing book collection in their apartment’s oven when she was growing up, sparking Jolie’s lifelong love of art and culture. “She took me to theater. She told me about meeting Tennessee Williams, and she introduced me to the Lee Strasberg Institute, where I would later study,” said Jolie. “I experience now the joy of seeing my own daughter love theater and getting involved.”

Best international feature went to Payal Kapadia‘s All We Imagine as Light, while best documentary went to No Other Land. Directed by a Palestinian-Israeli collective of four directors over the course of five years, No Other Land documents the destruction of Masafer Yatta, a group of Palestinian villages in the southern West Bank, during the Israel-Hamas war. Misty Copeland and Ryan Destiny accepted the award on the filmmakers’ behalf.

After being introduced by VF‘s editor-in-chief, Radhika Jones, The Black List founder and VF contributing editor Franklin Leonard added a jolt of energy to the proceedings while accepting another tribute—urging the audience to give a round of applause to those working the event. While no winners went fully political, like Robert De Niro delivering an unscripted “Fuck Trump” rant at last year’s Gothams, it was Leonard who came the closest. “Unlike some people in the news, I actually hire the very best people,” he quipped, receiving applause from the audience.

Vera Drew, recipient of the breakthrough director award for helming the zany and outlandish The People’s Joker, also got a rousing response when she directly addressed Kidman from the podium. “Ms. Kidman, I don’t know where you’re sitting, but when I was six years old, I saw Batman Forever in the theater in Baraboo, Wisconsin, and it was probably the moment I realized I was trans,” she said. “And I want to thank you for working with Joel Schumacher.” The camera caught a visibly thrilled Kidman reacting to the moment from her table.

Also visibly thrilled was Brandon Wilson, who was practically speechless when his co-star Aunjenae Ellis-Taylor presented him with the breakthrough performer award for Nickel Boys. Their director, RaMell Ross, also picked up the inaugural best director Gotham trophy for his visceral and artistic adaptation of Colson Whitehead‘s novel about two Black boys sent to a Florida reformatory school in the 1960s. “I think I’m the tallest person who’s ever been up here,” quipped ex-basketball player Ross, before paying tribute to the survivors and victims of the Dozier School, which served as the inspiration for the novel and film. “The Nickel Boys aesthetic is thinking about what can happen when you bring the camera into the body of a person and a character to give them life,” said Ross. “How do you give life to the Dozier School boys?”

While Nickel Boys picked up two competitive wins, it was Sing Sing, which follows incarcerated men putting on a play in prison via a Rehabilitation Through the Arts program, that would walk away with the most momentum of the night. First, the film’s cast, led by Domingo, accepted the social justice tribute and received the first standing ovation from the audience. The second standing ovation would come when Clarence “Divine Eye” Maclin, co-writer and star of Sing Sing, won the award for outstanding supporting performance in a category that also had nominated Lyonne for His Three Daughters, Danielle Deadwyler for The Piano Lesson, Guy Pearce for The Brutalist, and Kieran Culkin for A Real Pain, among others.

In his acceptance speech, Maclin—who, like many of the actors in Sing Sing, was formerly incarcerated—shouted out his mother, Mary Magdalene Horne. “I hope these tears are tears of joy today, Mom,” he said. “Know what I’m saying? If someone was to tell me that I would be here 10 years ago, you couldn’t make me believe you.” Sing Sing also prevailed in the lead performance category: Domingo beat stiff competition from Kidman for Babygirl, Moore for The Substance, Adrien Brody for The Brutalist, Mikey Madison for Anora, Marianne Jean-Baptiste for Hard Truths, and Justice Smith for I Saw The TV Glow. An emotional Domingo implored those listening to be ”a light in the darkness” in these times. “These men have shown me, they’ve hung on to it, and it’s changed their lives, and they’ve changed mine,” he said.

Although it wasn’t nominated for anything, Dune Part 2 loomed large over the proceedings as its two stars, Zendaya and Timothée Chalamet, and director Denis Villeneuve took home honorary awards. Josh O’Connor presented his Challengers co-star with the spotlight tribute, where he set the record straight once and for all: “Let it be known—Zen has never beaten me on a tennis court.” While accepting the award, Zendaya thanked her mom, who was in the audience (“She’s embarrassed,” she quipped) and highlighted her love of cinema and collaboration, thanking “everyone who makes movie-making possible.” She’d be back on stage soon to introduce Villeneuve for his director tribute with Jake Gyllenhaal, who cheekily introduced himself by saying “Hi, I am Timothée Chalamet”—and then somewhat awkwardly kept referring to Villeneuve as “the sand man” because, well, Dune.

Last but certainly not least, Chalamet—who was the punchline of a few jokes over the evening, thanks to Gyllenhaal and Ellis-Taylor’s invented pronunciation of his name (“Timothée Chalamat“)—accepted the visionary tribute award alongside A Complete Unknown director James Mangold. After an introduction from Oscar Isaac, Chalamet, rocking the tiny mustache he will sport in Josh Safdie‘s upcoming film Marty Supreme, kept his remarks short and sweet. “I’m looking out here, and I see a lot of people that have helped shape the man I’m becoming, an artist I’m becoming, and all sitting right here,” he said, before forgoing the teleprompter and reading his remarks from a piece of paper. “I’m feeling incredibly grateful tonight. I’m grateful to everyone who poured themselves into this project, everyone who helped me along this process, the last five years of my life.”

And while Sing Sing certainly left the night with renewed energy heading into award season, it was A Different Man, which follows an aspiring actor who undergoes a drastic medical procedure to change his appearance, that took home the the coveted best feature trophy, besting Babygirl, Challengers, Nickel Boys, and presumed frontrunner Anora. A visibly shocked team took the stage after Chastain announced that A Different Man had won. Joined by stars Sebastian Stan and Adam Pearson, a visibly flustered director Adam Schimberg admitted he was “totally stunned” by the moment. “I’m sorry I really didn’t prepare a better speech,” he concluded. “I really didn’t see this as a possibility.” Well, anything can happen at the Gothams.