The Directors Guild of America awarded its top prize for feature filmmaking to Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert for “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” putting them on course to win at the Academy Awards next month.
The 75th annual DGA Awards, held at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, California, on Saturday night, denied Steven Spielberg a record-extending four wins for the guild’s highest honor. Spielberg had previously been expected to cruise into awards season with his autobiographical “The Fabelmans,” but the strong love of “Everything Everywhere All at Once” — the Oscar favorite with a leading 11 nominations — came to dominate. in the Oscar run-up in Hollywood.
In the past 10 years, all but one DGA winner has won the Academy Awards. (In 2020, Sam Mendes won the DGA for “1917,” while Bong Joon Ho won the Oscar for “Parasite.”) Last year, Jane Campion (“The Power of the Dog”) won every one. In 75 years, only 10 times did the DGA winner and the Oscar winner not align.
The other nominees are: Todd Field (“Tár”), Martin McDonagh (“The Banshees of Inisherin”) and Joseph Kosinski (“Top Gun: Maverick”). The same filmmakers are nominated for best director at the March 12 Oscars, with one exception. The academy chose Ruben Östlund (“Triangle of Sadness”) over Kosinski.
Kwan and Scheinert, the filmmaking pair known as “The Daniels,” are only the third duo to win the DGA’s top award, following Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins for “West Side Story” ( 1961) and Joel Coen and Ethan Coen for “No. Country for Old Men” (2007). They are also too young (both 35) and too early in their careers (this is their second feature film) to win with the guild – especially for a veteran like Spielberg. He holds the record for most DGA nominations with 13.
No woman was nominated by the DGA or the film academy for best director this year. But two of the guild’s other top awards went to female filmmakers. Best first part went to Charlotte Wells for the father-daughter drama “Aftersun.” The best documentary was awarded to Sara Dosa for “Fire of Love,” about an adventurous French volcanologist couple.
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