Everyone knows that comedic roles don’t get Oscars. There are some roles, though, that deliver on such a level that they are probably more clever and more difficult than most of the dramatic roles.
I remember confirmed dramatic actor Michael Douglas explaining:
“F-you!” “No, F-You!” There, you have drama. Now , I dare you make me laugh.
I nominate Bill Murray for Groundhog Day, which has gone into the language, and which is one my most quotable movies. The lines suit him so well that I’m convinced he must have written many of them. Considering the number of Oscar nominees who are mostly forgotten, I nominate this one for the Veterans Committee to reconsider.
Jeff Bridges as The Dude. Another one of the most quotable movies ever, and Bridges absolutely is the character. He’s hilarious and he’s completely believable as this easygoing loser. The Dude would have been a caricature in the hands of a lesser actor.
George Clooney for O Brother, Where Art Thou? deserved at least a nomination. He WON a Golden Globe for it, but wasn’t nominated for an Oscar.
Two other notable comedic performances that won Golden Globes but weren’t nominated for Oscars:
Nicole Kidman in To Die For. She absolutely deserved an Oscar nomination, it’s arguably her very best performance, definitely one of her best. I can’t see her winning over Susan Sarandon, but a nomination, maybe instead of Sharon Stone (Casino), would have been nice.
That same year…
John Travolta for Get Shorty*. He was very good, but it doesn’t bother me that he didn’t get nominated. I still think it’s funny.
I agree with Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, and Jeff Bridges in The Big Lebowski. They should have at least been nominated.
*[pure wild off-topic conjecture](I don’t know that Travolta deserved an Oscar nomination for Get Shorty, but everyone expected him to get one, so it was quite amusing to me when he didn’t. Maybe if he’d kept his mouth shut. He was winning several awards for Get Shorty, all of them coming before the Oscar ballots were due, and in every single speech he mentioned L. Ron Hubbard. I’ve long suspected that he got punished for that by people not putting his name on their ballot. I’ve also long suspected that Nicole Kidman was unfairly splashed by the Scientology backlash because she was married to Tom Cruise, and that’s why she didn’t get her deserved nomination. She had to divorce Tom before more people started taking her seriously as an actress.)[/pure wild off-topic conjecture]
Another reason I remember reading about on why **Nicole Kidman **wasn’t nominated for To Die For was that many people thought her character in the movie wasn’t too far removed from her in real life. (I’m not one of them.)
Incidentally, despite that, I do agree with you that Kidman was more than worthy of a nomination for that role.