Speculating the 2021 Oscars: Boseman, Davis, and Kirby.

"Ma Rainey's Black Bottom" was another "prestige film" speculated to garner attention during awards season. The film stars acclaimed and beloved actors, produced in part by Denzel Washington, and is based on the late August Wilson's play of the same name. Considering these factors, it was predicted the film would have had its place in the awards lineup. It was speculation, that is, until Chadwick Boseman, star of "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom" opposite Academy Award Winner Viola Davis, tragically passed away in late 2020. After Boseman's death, "Ma Rainey's" presence at the 2021 Academy Awards is certain.

Boseman was beloved not only for is acting talent, but for his personality and work ethic. He took the role of King T'Challa, the Black Panther, within the Marvel Cinematic Universe in stride, creating a space with his character and his own persona for people of color to see themselves on-screen. "Black Panther" was also popular during its awards season, bringing home a hodge-podge of various accolades. With everything Boseman brought to the table, "Black Panther" could never be the summit of his potential. Due to his untimely death to colon cancer, Chadwick Boseman's pinnacle performance will forever be "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom." Nothing is ever set in stone, but Academy voting is as temperamental as the stock market - driven by emotion. The actors voting in the 2021 Oscars will surely be moved by not only Boseman's apex performance, but also his tragedy. Boseman's filmography reflects a superb and evolutionary body of work that has warranted accolades many times over. That, combined with "Ma Rainey" and Boseman's final performance, will bring him the Oscar nomination, if not Oscar himself. Of course, these circumstances cannot be completely removed from the Oscar that was posthumously awarded to the late Heath Ledger for his performance as The Joker in "The Dark Knight." Despite the circumstances, Ledger's performance was very much deserving of the Oscar, as is Boseman, particularly as a first-time individual nominee.

Speaking of first-time nominees, Viola Davis may be upset for the Oscar by Vanessa Kirby's performance in "Pieces of a Woman," which hits Netflix on Thursday. The festival circuit indicates great potential for Kirby and "Pieces of a Woman," with both garnering positive reviews and awards as the film made its rounds. With “Pieces of a Woman” about to be released en masse, the landscape of the 2021 awards season will begin to take more shape. The film is still in the running for this year, as the Academy voted to extend the awards ceremony and deadlines due to the Coronavirus pandemic.

This means that the trend of first-time nominees taking home the gold, particularly for actresses, may very well hold fast. In recent history, Alicia Vikander, Regina King, Lupita Nyong’o, Allison Janney, Olivia Coleman, Patricia Arquette, Brie Larson, and Octavia Spencer have all been first-time nominee winners of the Academy Award for either Best Actress or Best Supporting Actress since 2010. That is an astonishing statistic. Despite the tragedy around Boseman's death as well as the caliber and integrity of Davis's performance, the jury is still out on Davis to become a two-time Academy Award winner in 2021. Simply put, there is no reason to believe that the voters won't change their trend of voting and give Kirby the Oscar, especially given that "Pieces of a Woman" is subjectively a more ambitious film, and role for Kirby, than "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom." Then again, if “Pieces of a Woman” doesn’t resonate with large audiences, popular opinion may change the minds of the Academy voters. Of course, nothing is set in stone. Emotions are fickle and unpredictable. The voting trends of the Academy members would not be the only thing changed by 2020. Still, the signs point towards the very real potential of Vanessa Kirby, as Best Actress, photographed alone, and sadly not because of social distancing. "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom" is rated R and available for streaming on Netflix. "Pieces of a Woman" is rated R and will be available Thursday for streaming on Netflix.