Every week from now until the critics groups start giving out their prizes for the best of the year, I’m going to be spotlighting the big Oscar players and their chances at Oscar glory this year.

In our second week, I’ll be taking a look at the long Oscar history of Meryl Streep, an actress whose very appearance in a film sparks Oscar rumors and, in the last decade, a rampant bias pitting fans with the Academy who refuse to give the vaunted actress her third Oscar. Her champions might just get their wish this year.

Streep had her first live-action big screen appearance in 1977’s Oscar winner Julia where she appears briefly in a blink-and-you-miss-it scene. She was 28. In the last 33 years, she has racked up more Oscar nominations than Katharine Hepburn who earned 12 nominations in her varied career. Bette Davis comes in third with 10. Streep? She’s at 16 so far and shows no signs of stopping. While she didn’t earn a nomination for her first appearance, her second, 1978’s The Deer Hunter. She then won her first Oscar on her second nomination for the next year’s Kramer vs. Kramer. With only five films under her belt, it would come as little surprise that she would go on to win a second Oscar and pick up her 16th nomination just two years ago.

Even though she is now 62, finally past the Oscar-winning wasteland (few actresses have won Oscars while in their 50s, only one of which in the Best Actress), she still faces an uphill battle to win her third Oscar which would put her in a very small club with Hepburn (4), Jack Nicholson (3), Ingrid Bergman (3) and character actor Walter Brennan (3). Whether she wins her third this year or not, a sixteenth nomination is guaranteed.

An interesting fact: since her debut in 1977, a 34-year career, only one year (1980) has not seen the release of a movie, television series or television movie starring Streep. 33 years of work without showing any signs of slowing down (she’s had several years in the last decade that saw one or more of her films released).

The Iron Lady

While the content of the film is relatively unknown, we know that Streep will be playing Britain’s first female Prime Minister leading up to and including her rise to power. Margaret Thatcher is a very prominent figure in world history, so that should earn Streep some points towards her 3rd Oscar. And the Academy has proven they like and admire actors playing political leaders. Beginning at the 3rd Academy Awards for the films of 1929/30, the Academy has regularly awarded such performances (that year, George Arliss won the Oscar for playing Benjamin Disraeli in the titular Disraeli). Other real life monarchs or leaders awarded: Charles Laughton as Henry VIII in The Private Life of Henry VIII (1932/33), Yul Brynner as the King of Siam in The King and I (1956), Paul Scofield as Sir Thomas More in A Man for All Seasons (1966), Katharine Hepburn as Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine in The Lion in Winter (1968), Ben Kingsley as Mahatma Gandhi in Gandhi (1982), Judi Dench as Queen Elizabeth I in Shakespeare in Love (1998), Forest Whitaker as Idi Amin in The Last King of Scotland (2006), Helen Mirren as Queen Elizabeth II in The Queen (2006) and Colin Firth as King George VI in The King’s Speech (2010).

Although she doesn’t get nominated each time out, there’s enough consistency in the last two decades when it comes to dramatic roles even in poorly reviewed films (One True Thing, Music of the Heart, Julie & Julia) that I think she should not have any problem getting a sixteenth nod this year. The question will not be whether she gets nominated, but if she will win her third trophy. The jury’s out and each time she’s seemed like a solid contender, a younger actress has swept in to take the prize, so we’ll have to wait until Oscar time to know the full range of possibilities.

Forecast Categories (where the film is most likely to compete): Picture, Director, Actress, Original Screenplay

Meryl Streep’s Oscar History

• Julia (1977)
• The Deer Hunter (1978) – Nominated for Best Supporting Actress
• Manhattan (1979)
• The Seduction of Joe Tynan (1979)
• Kramer vs. Kramer (1979) – Received the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress
• The French Lieutenant’s Woman (1981) – Nominated for Best Actress
• Still of the Night (1982)
• Sophie’s Choice (1982) – Received the Oscar for Best Actress
• Silkwood (1983) – Nominated for Best Actress
• Falling in Love (1984)
• Plenty (1985)
• Out of Africa (1985) – Nominated for Best Actress
• Heartburn (1986)
• Ironweed (1987) – Nominated for Best Actress
• A Cry in the Dark (1988) – Nominated for Best Actress
• She-Devil (1989)
• Postcards from the Edge (1990) – Nominated for Best Actress
• Defending Your Life (1991)
• Death Becomes Her (1992)
• The House of the Spirits (1993)
• The River Wild (1994)
• The Bridges of Madison County (1995) – Nominated for Best Actress
• Before and After (1996)
• Marvin’s Room (1996)
• Dancing at Lughnasa (1998)
• One True Thing (1998) – Nominated for Best Actress
• Music of the Heart (1999) – Nominated for Best Actress
• Adaptation. (2002) – Nominated for Best Supporting Actress
• The Hours (2002)
• The Manchurian Candidate (2004)
• Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004)
• Prime (2005)
• A Prairie Home Companion (2006)
• The Devil Wears Prada (2006) – Nominated for Best Actress
• Dark Matter (2007)
• Evening (2007)
• Rendition (2007)
• Lions for Lambs (2007)
• Mamma Mia! (2008)
• Doubt (2008) – Nominated for Best Actress
• Julie & Julia (2009) – Nominated for Best Actress
• It’s Complicated (2009)
• The Iron Lady (2011)