It’s incredible to me that Robert Redford only won one Oscar in his iconic career that spanned almost six decades. His lone win came for Best Director for 1980’s Ordinary People. Redford, who died this week at 89, did win an Honorary Oscar in 2002 for his work in Hollywood over his career, but that doesn’t make up for all the snubs over the years. He was only nominated in an actor category once, for Here are nine times Robert Redford could have won an Oscar for his acting performance or his directing.
The Sting (Best Actor)
This might blow your mind: Robert Redford was only nominated for one Oscar in an acting category in his whole career. It came in 1974 for his performance alongside Robert Shaw and Paul Newman in one of the best gambling movies of all time, 1973’s The Sting. The beloved film took home seven Oscars that year, including for Best Picture and Best Director (George Roy Hill), but Redford lost out to Jack Lemmon in Save the Tiger. I mean no offense to the late Jack Lemmon, but The Sting and Redford’s performance are far more iconic all these years later.
Quiz Show (Best Director)
I may be biased here, as Quiz Show is one of my all-time favorite movies. It gets lost in the shuffle in the debate over what is the best film from 1994, as it was nominated for Best Picture alongside Pulp Fiction, The Shawshank Redemption, Four Weddings and a Funeral and the eventual (and controversial) winner, Forrest Gump. Quiz Show didn’t break new ground like Pulp Fiction, and it didn’t become what CinemaBlend calls the best movie of the ‘90s, like Shawshank, but it is an incredible, perfectly constructed movie.
Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid (Best Actor)
1969’s Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid was Redford’s true breakout moment, though his career started in the early ‘60s. It was teaming up with Paul Newman in Butch and Sundance that launched him into superstardom, a lofty position he would maintain for the rest of his career. Not only is it one of the best Westerns ever made, but the chemistry between the two lead actors is off the charts.
Redford thought so highly of the part and the movie that he named his now-legendary film festival, The Sundance Festival, after it.
The Natural (Best Actor)
For many in Gen X, including myself, our first real introduction to Robert Redford was in 1984’s The Natural. The actor stars as Roy Hobbs, a baseball phenom in the 1920s whose career is derailed after he is shot by a jealous fan of “The Whammer.” He returns to baseball 16 years later, hitting an epic home run into the lights of the stadium, thus creating one of the most iconic moments in film history. It’s performances like this one that made Redford beloved to every generation since the post-war baby boom. It wasn’t enough for the Academy, though, which didn’t even nominate him.
Glenn Close, his co-star in the movie (and another actor too often snubbed by The Academy), even called Redford her “best onscreen kiss” recently. That alone should tell you how badly his performance was ignored!
A River Runs Through It (Best Director)
The third movie of Redford’s directorial career came in 1992 with the magnificently beautiful A River Runs Through It. The stunning cinematography was rewarded with a well-deserved Oscar for Philippe Rousselot, but Redford didn’t even get nominated for Best Director. For shame, Academy. It’s such a wonderful movie, and though beating Clint Eastwood for his direction of Unforgiven would have been a tall task, not even being nominated really stings.
All Is Lost (Best Actor)
One of Robert Redford’s last great performances of his career, in 2013’s All Is Lost, is one of his truly unique roles. Not only was the role incredibly demanding on the then-77-year-old actor, but the role, which can be watched with an Amazon Prime subscription, also had almost no dialogue and no co-stars. Redford was literally a one-man show in the amazing movie.
Despite the lack of dialogue, Redford’s performance is one of the most gripping of his career, and it’s astounding to me that he didn’t get more accolades for it. Matthew McConaughey won the Oscar in 2014 for his amazing performance in Dallas Buyers Club, but one can say that they’d have been disappointed to see Redford win.
All The President’s Men (Best Actor)
I’ll admit that I grew up a political junkie who dreamed of working in political journalism, and the Watergate Scandal fascinated me, going back to high school. I can only assume that was in large part due to seeing the political thriller All the President’s Men. Not only did the movie do an incredible job of telling the story of Woodward (Redford) and Bernstein (Dustin Hoffman), but it took what could have been a very dry story and made it exciting and tense.
The entire cast puts in career-defining performances, and while Hoffman and Jane Alexander were nominated for Oscars, Jason Robards won for Best Supporting Actor for his role as Washington Post editor-in-chief Ben Bradlee; Redford was again snubbed completely.
Out Of Africa (Best Actor)
Out of Africa may be another example of showing my bias, as I first saw it in 1990 when I was a teenager about to travel to Kenya, where the movie is set. It’s not the kind of movie you’d expect a young guy to like, but I loved the scenery and the performances from both Redford and his co-star Meryl Streep. The film, directed by Sydney Pollack, crushed the 1986 Oscar Awards, taking home seven awards, including Streep for Best Actress in one of her most best roles, Pollack for Best Director, and Best Picture. Redford didn’t even get a nomination for his excellent performance. It would be comical if it weren’t so absurd.
To Mr. Redford, I say rest in peace knowing that your many iconic performances touched the lives of millions, including me, even if the Academy never seemed to appreciate them as much as audiences did.