Greta Gerwig and Christopher Nolan, the filmmakers behind the “Barbenheimer” summer box office pairing of “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer,” respectively, were among the nominees announced Wednesday for the coveted Directors Guild of America Award for feature film directing.
Also scoring nominations for the prize were Yorgos Lanthimos for “Poor Things,” Alexander Payne for “The Holdovers” and Martin Scorsese for “Killers of the Flower Moon.”
The DGA Award is historically a solid predictor of who will take home the Academy Award for best director. Since 1948, there have only been eight times that the winner of the DGA award for feature film directing has not gone on to win the Oscar for best director. The most recent time was in 2020, when Sam Mendes won the DGA Award for “1917,” but the Oscar went to Bong Joon Ho for “Parasite.”
Nolan on Sunday won the Golden Globe Award for best director for “Oppenheimer.”
The DGA on Wednesday also announced nominations for first-time theatrical feature film directing, with the nods going to Cord Jefferson for “American Fiction,” Manuela Martelli for “Chile ’76,” Noora Niasari for “Shayda,” A.V. Rockwell for “A Thousand and One” and Celine Song for “Past Lives.”
“In a year full of so many extraordinary films, DGA members have nominated an incredible group of gifted storytellers,” DGA President Lesli Linka Glatter said in a statement. “Their films fused technical prowess with unique artistic visions that captured the depth of the human experience and left an indelible impact on audiences around the world. Congratulations to these superb directors on their well-deserved nominations.”
The 76th annual DGA Awards ceremony will be held Feb. 10 at the Beverly Hilton.