Sean Baker Makes Oscar History, Achieving a Feat Coppola, Cuaron and Walt Disney Never Could

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So many of the greats had come close.

Francis Ford Coppola had a good shot at doing it.

Alfonso Cuaron and Chloe Zhao got halfway to doing it.

Walt Disney needed a whole bunch of movies to do it.

Bong Joon-ho nearly did it.

But until Sunday, no filmmaker had done it — it: won four Academy Awards for the same movie.

Sean Baker achieved a remarkable feat by winning Oscars for his roles as producer, director, writer, and editor of the original movie “Anora” on Sunday.

It’s quite remarkable that such a feat hadn’t been achieved in the 96 past Academy Award ceremonies, given the plethora of talented individuals who had graced those stages before. However, an exception was made in 1954 when Walt Disney took home four Oscars for his diverse body of work across four different films.

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It’s surprising that no one else had achieved this feat in the 96 Academy Award ceremonies prior to 1954, given the abundance of talented individuals who had participated before. However, Walt Disney broke the mold by winning four Oscars for his work across four different films that year.

In 2019 and 2021, Cuaron and Zhao both received four nominations each for their movies “Roma” and “Nomadland”, respectively, but they both took home just two awards each.

In 1974, Coppola won three awards for The Godfather: Part II, but he didn’t win for his other two nominations, which were for The Conversation. Similarly, composer Alan Menken took home three Oscars in 1993 for Beauty and the Beast , but he missed out on the other two.

On Sunday, we came the nearest to achieving it earlier when Bong Joon Ho presented Parasite on four occasions in 2020. However, the fourth presentation was for an international award given to the host nation.

Baker won four Oscars, for four jobs, on the same movie.

It’s unbelievable; many of them are my idols,” Baker said to The Hollywood Reporter when they informed him in January that he was part of a select few who had been nominated four times in the same year.

On Sunday things got even more freaky as the 54-year-old’s name was called again and again.

Indeed, it appeared as if Baker was running out of individuals to acknowledge after winning his second award, but he quickly overcame this by shouting out to his dog, Bunsen upon leaving the stage. However, he didn’t stop there, and went on to win Oscars No. 3 and No. 4. For the first, he advocated for theatrical films as a unifying element in our society, while for the second, he paid tribute to independent film productions. (Additionally, the other producers could handle that last bit.)

A portion of the credit can be given to the Academy’s current openness towards celebrating independent filmmakers, who often take on multiple roles in a project. Notably, director Jacques Audiard, who goes by Emilia Pérez, received four nominations this year as well.

A significant portion of his success, though, can be attributed to Baker’s relentless work ethic. This is because he engages in a type of independent filmmaking that ultimately earns him acclaim. If contemporary Hollywood is characterized by collaborative filmmaking, Baker’s approach is more akin to “my team and I will make it happen” – an approach he has consistently employed on previous projects like The Florida Project, Tangerine, and Starlet, which despite their diversity, were all self-produced.

Baker expressed gratitude towards the Academy for honoring an authentic indie movie when he received his fourth Oscar. He noted that the film was a product of hard work and dedication from remarkable independent artists. Come Sunday, their efforts were rewarded with bronze and gold.

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2025-03-03 08:54