While 81 songs in all were eligible to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song at the upcoming Oscars, only 15 have made the short list in the category — including songs by Taylor Swift, The Weeknd, Lady Gaga and Rihanna.
The Academy’s Music Branch voted on the 81 songs to create the short list. Among them are Lady Gaga’s “Hold My Hand” from Maverick: Top Gun; Taylor’s “Carolina” from Where the Crawdads Sing; The Weeknd’s “Nothing Is Lost (You Give Me Strength)” from Avatar: The Way of Water; and Rihanna’s “Lift Me Up” from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.
Also nominated is Selena Gomez‘s “My Mind & Me,” from her documentary Selena Gomez: My Mind & Me; “Time,” a song from the movie Amsterdam that’s performed by Givēon and co-written by Givēon and Drake; and “Applause,” written by Diane Warren for the anthology film Tell It Like a Woman.
It’s worth noting that it’s the songwriters who take home the Oscar for this category, but in most of these cases, the artist who sang the nominated song also had a hand in writing it.
Meanwhile, it appears as though Swift’s All Too Well: The Short Film didn’t make the cut for the category of Live Action Short Film. That category has been whittled down to 15 eligible films, but All Too Well isn’t among them.
Oscar voting begins on Thursday, January 12; the nominations will be announced on Tuesday, January 24. The 95th Oscars take place Sunday, March 12, at the Dolby Theatre at Ovation Hollywood and will air on ABC-TV.
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