For our ninth Rundown article, we examine the final acting category. After the jump, you’ll find our winner and runner-up predictions for Best Actress as well as general commentary about the race. Tuesday, we’ll cover two of the shortest categories available.

Best Actress

Winner Predictions

• Isabelle Huppert – Elle (PP O)
• Ruth Negga – Loving
• Natalie Portman – Jackie
• Emma Stone – La La Land (WL O) (TB O) (TL O)
• Meryl Streep – Florence Foster Jenkins

Runner-Up Predictions

• Isabelle Huppert – Elle (TL R) [New]
• Natalie Portman – Jackie (WL O) (PP O)
• Meryl Streep – Florence Foster Jenkins (TB O)

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Wesley Lovell: Now that the final group with a Best Actress prize that will have an impact on the Oscars has announced, it seems clear that Emma Stone may be well on her way to an Oscar. Although the British Academy Awards (BAFTA) didn’t include one of the key Oscar competitors (Isabelle Huppert), it did feature the two frontrunners in this category: Emma Stone and Natalie Portman. While British voters might not truly appreciate a character like Jackie Kennedy, they can still recognize fine performances and while they didn’t give all the love to La La Land that other groups have, they still picked Stone.
Peter J. Patrick: Isabelle Huppert has won the brunt of the precursor awards for Best Actress, which would normally make her the Oscar frontrunner. To me, she is still the obvious frontrunner, but Huppert has two things going against her – her age and the fact that her performance isn’t in the English language. That’s why the pundits insist that La La Land‘s Emma Stone is the more likely winner. I’ll not only stick with Huppert, I’ll go one further and say that Natalie Portman’s Jackie is also a stronger candidate than Stone’s charming, but weak-voiced singer-actress.
Tripp Burton: Emma Stone keeps picking up awards for La La Land and I don’t see her being stopped at the Oscars. Hollywood has decided that it is her time, and she doesn’t have much competition in the category. Natalie Portman and Meryl Streep both recently won, while Isabelle Huppert and Ruth Negga are in films that the Academy didn’t seem in a rush to award. This should be Stone’s victory easily.
Thomas La Tourrette: Emma Stone has long been the frontrunner in this category, but a somewhat weak one. With time, however, she has cemented her position and looks likely to win on her second nomination. Her portrayal of the hopeful actress was charming and she would be a worthy winner. After the SAG win cemented her position, the hardest prediction to make is who stands the best chance of upsetting her. For a long time that seemed to be Natalie Portman for Jackie. If she had not won a few years earlier for Black Swan, I think she would be not only Emma’s main competition but actually the person to beat. I am just not certain that the Academy is ready to make her a two-time winner, which helped keep Emma in the lead position. Now I wonder if the runner up position belongs to Isabelle Huppert for her tough portrayal of a rape victim in Elle. She was really good in the role, but I had such hard problems with the believability of the film and the characters’ motivations, that I could see some Academy voters having some problems voting for her. However, I think she stands a better chance of an upset than another ingénue would, so I am moving her into the spoiler spot, even though I expect Emma to win. I was very pleased to see Ruth Negga get a nomination for her incandescent performance in Loving. I was afraid she would get left out of the final five, but am glad she made it. Sadly Amy Adams did get left out, even with two strong performances in Arrival and Nocturnal Animals. I did not think she would win, but thought she should have been in the race. Meryl Streep took the final spot for Florence Foster Jenkins. She was good as a tone deaf opera singer, but has been better in other films over the years. Her fiery speech at the Golden Globes may garner her a number of votes, but probably not enough to become only the second four-time acting winner. Emma Stone wins fairly handily, but probably not by the margins that were expected.

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