LOS ANGELES (AP) — “KPop Demon Hunters," Amy Madigan and “Frankenstein” won early awards at the 98th Academy Awards, and the first Oscar for best casting went to Cassandra Kulukundis for “One Battle After Another.”
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences introduced the casting category for the first time in 2026. The inaugural award went to the best picture favorite.
"I have to thank the academy for even adding this category," said Kulukundis.
As expected, the Netflix sensation “KPop Demon Hunters,” 2025’s most-watched film, won best animated feature. It was a big win for Netflix but a more qualified victory for the movie’s producer, Sony Pictures. Though it developed and produced the film, Sony sold “KPop Demon Hunters” to the streaming giant instead of giving it a theatrical release.
On Netflix, “KPop Demon Hunters” became a cultural phenomenon and the streaming platform’s biggest hit. It has more than 325 million views and counting.
“This is for Korea and Koreans everywhere,” said co-director Maggie Kang.
Madigan won best supporting actress for her performance in the horror thriller “Weapons,” a win that came 40 years after the 75-year-old actor was first nominated, in 1986, for “Twice in a Lifetime.”
Letting out a giant laugh as she hit the stage, Madigan exclaimed, “This is great!”
Another Netflix release, Guillermo del Toro's “Frankenstein” picked up a pair of awards for its lavish craft, for costume design and makeup and hairstyling.
Hosting for the second time, Conan O'Brien began the Dolby Theatre show alluding to “chaotic and frightening times." But he argued that the current geopolitical climate made the Oscars all the more resonate as a globally unifying force.
"We pay tribute tonight, not just to film, but to the ideals of global artistry, collaboration, patience, resilience and that rarest of qualities today — optimism,” O'Brien said. “We’re going to celebrate. Not because we think all is well, but because we work, and hope, for better.”
O'Brien also joked, though, that the night could get political. As an alternative, like the Super Bowl halftime show, he said Kid Rock would be hosting an alterative Oscars at Dave & Busters.
Some of O'Brien's best digs came at the expense of the streamers. Netflix chief Ted Sarandos, he joked, was in a theater for the first time. O'Brien also lamented the lack of nominees for Amazon MGM: “Why isn't the website I order toilet paper from winning more Oscars?”
“I’m honored to be the last human host of the Academy Awards,” said O'Brien. "Next year it’s going to be a Waymo in a tux.”
The 98th Academy Awards were steering toward a coronation for either Paul Thomas Anderson or Ryan Coogler. Most would call that a win-win.
Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” is the favorite heading into the ceremony at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles. But Coogler’s “Sinners” comes in the lead nominee with a record 16 nominations. Both filmmakers are poised to leave with their first Oscar.
But little else is assured at an Academy Awards where Michael B. Jordan or Timothée Chalamet (despite the ballet diss heard 'round the world) could win their first Academy Award in a too-close-to-call best actor race.
The already high security was even greater at the Oscar ceremony, taking place two weeks after the United States and President Donald Trump launched the war with Iran. Some attendees wore pins reading “Artists for cease fire.”
“Of course, every year we monitor what’s going on in the world,” Raj Kapoor, executive producer of the show, said earlier in the week. “We have the support of the FBI and the LAPD, and it’s a close collaboration.”
Only two of the five best song nominees were to be performed: “I Lied to You,” from “Sinners,” with Miles Caton, Raphael Saadiq and others; and “Golden” from “KPop Demon Hunters.”
It seemed all but certain that the night’s final award wouldn't go to a streaming release; Apple's “CODA” remains the only streaming film to achieve that distinction. Instead, best picture is likely to go to an anomaly in today’s movie industry: big-budget original films from a personal vision.
“Sinners” and “One Battle After Another” were both theatrical releases shot on film. And both came from Warner Bros., the legacy studio that’s agreed to merge with David Ellison’s new media colossus, Paramount Skydance. The $111 billion deal, which awaits regulatory approval, has rattled an industry already reconciling itself to the acquisitions of MGM (by Amazon) and 20th Century Fox (by The Walt Disney Co.).
Elegy may mark Sunday’s Oscars. The in memoriam segment is expected to include, among many others, remembrances of Robert Redford, Diane Keaton and Robert Duvall. O’Brien, who had hosted a party attended by Rob and Michele Reiner the night before their deaths, has promised a “very powerful” tribute.
New this year is a best casting category. Another innovation is a requirement that Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences members watch all nominees before voting. On the academy’s streaming platform — even Oscar voting is streamed — voters had to check a box attesting to having watched each nominee before voting in a category.
Though the Oscars often feel largely removed from their times, a crop of nominees that explicitly grapple with the current political moment will be center stage. That includes not just “One Battle After Another,” which opens with a raid on an immigration detention facility, but movies like Kleber Mendonça Filho’s Brazilian political thriller “The Secret Agent” and Jafar Panahi’s Iranian revenge drama “It Was Just an Accident.”
The war in Iran has particular meaning to Panahi, whose film is nominated for best international feature and for best screenplay. The esteemed Iranian filmmaker and last year's Palme d'Or winner has made films clandestinely in his native Iran despite repeated imprisonment, travel ban and even home arrest. While promoting the film, Panahi was sentenced to a year in prison. At least one of his cowriter nominees, Mehdi Mahmoudian, was unable to leave Iran to attend Sunday’s awards.
Twenty three years ago, the Academy Awards were also held amid war in the Middle East. The 2003 Oscars took place just three days before the Iraq War began. Many in Hollywood protested the war. “Chicago” won best picture.
The telecast is airing live on ABC and streaming on Hulu. (YouTube will be the new home of the Oscars beginning in 2029.)
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