Annette Bening has been a household name for the majority of her decades-long career in film and television. During that time, she’s earned recognition and nominations from major awards bodies like the BAFTAs, the Golden Globes, the Emmys, the SAG Awards and the Tony Awards, becoming one of the most decorated performers in the process.
Bening added to her collection of nominations just this year, when she received an Academy Award nod for Best Actress for her role as journalist and long-distance swimmer Diana Nyad in Nyad. That’s only the latest in Bening’s long history with the Academy, however, and while her chances at taking home the trophy this year are somewhat slim given Emma Stone and Lily Gladstone‘s frontrunner status, she has seen success at the Oscars in the past.
As the beloved actress sets her sights on Oscar glory at the upcoming 96th Academy Awards, we’re looking back at just how many Oscar nominations Annette Bening has.
How many Oscar nominations does Annette Bening have?
Annette Bening has received a total of five Oscar nominations throughout her career, though she hasn’t collected a trophy yet. The actress’ first nod came in 1990 when she was nominated in the Best Supporting Actress category for her role in Stephen Frears’ crime thriller The Grifters. She lost out that year to Whoopi Goldberg (who won for Ghost), but it wasn’t long before Bening had another chance to take home the win.
In 1999, Bening received her first Best Actress nomination for American Beauty, the Sam Mendes-directed film in which she played materialistic wife Carolyn Burnham. That was yet another competitive race for Bening, with Hilary Swank ultimately receiving the win for her role in Boys Don’t Cry. Five years later, Bening was up again for Best Actress, this time for her portrayal of theatre actress Julia Lambert in 2004’s Being Julia.
The 2004 Best Actress race was notable in that both Bening and Swank were nominated in the category for the second consecutive year, but Swank took the win again, this time for her role in Million Dollar Baby.
2010 saw Bening’s next nomination, again in the Best Actress category for the comedy-drama film The Kids Are Alright. She received the nod alongside Nicole Kidman (for Rabbit Hole) and Jennifer Lawrence (for Winter’s Bone), but it was Natalie Portman who won for Black Swan.
Which brings us to this year, where Bening is up for her fifth Oscar for Nyad, in which she stars opposite Jodie Foster. Bening is nominated in a particularly competitive category, which includes the likes of Carey Mulligan (for Maestro) and Sandra Sandra Hüller (for Anatomy of a Fall), but Stone and Gladstone are considered the frontrunners.
Perhaps the Academy will consider a win for Bening long overdue, but Glenn Close’s loss to Olivia Coleman in 2018 proves that voters aren’t always doling out ‘lifetime achievement’ wins.