Ericka Henriquez

The 97th Academy Awards ceremony opened on Sunday at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles, bringing together the brightest stars in cinema. 

Several Yale alumni were in attendance, including Jeremy Strong ’01, Edward Norton ’91, Wynton Grant MUS ’17 and Da’Vine Joy Randolph DRA ’11. Strong and Norton were nominated for Best Actor in a Supporting Role, respectively, while Grant was a violinist in the Oscars’ live orchestra and Randolph was a presenter. Colman Domingo, a former School of Drama faculty member, was also nominated for Best Actor in a Leading Role.

“Studios do spend heavily, investing millions of dollars and sometimes tens of millions of dollars, in Oscar campaigns promoting their films,” visiting professor of finance Abraham Ravid wrote. “Nominations can certainly lift the profile of a film or an actor.”

Jeremy Strong ’01, who was nominated for Best Supporting Actor for his role in “The Apprentice,” attended the ceremony. The biographical film, which explores President Donald Trump’s real estate career in New York City during the 1970s and 1980s, was called “fake” and “classless” by Trump.

Strong, who was accepted to Yale with a recommendation from DreamWorks Pictures, initially planned to major in theatre studies. However, his first acting class left him uncomfortable when the professor spoke about Konstantin Stanislavski, the renowned Soviet theatre practitioner.

“Something in me just shut down,” Strong told The New Yorker. “I remember feeling, I need to run from this and protect whatever inchoate instinct I might have.”

He later switched to an English major, but continued to explore his theatre interests, starring in productions of “American Buffalo,” “Hughie” and “The Indian Wants the Bronx” –— all plays in which Al Pacino had starred. During his junior year, Strong hosted Pacino on campus, an event that nearly bankrupted the Yale Dramatic Association, the event’s sponsor.

Edward Norton ’91 was also nominated for Best Supporting Actor in “A Complete Unknown,” a biographical musical drama movie of Bob Dylan. Norton played Pete Seeger, an American banjo-playing folk singer, songwriter and activist who popularized American folk music and deeply influenced bluegrass music.

Norton majored in history at Yale, competed for the Yale rowing team and became fluent in Japanese. After graduation, he worked for Enterprise Community Partners, an American nonprofit focused on advancing racial equality and economic mobility, in Osaka, Japan. He also founded Class 5 Films with his former roommate, Stuart Blumberg ’91.

Strong and Norton ultimately lost the award to Kieran Culkin for his performance in “A Real Pain,” a comedy-drama about reunited cousins who embark on a Jewish heritage tour through Poland in honor of their late grandmother.

Another Yale-trained artist also took part in the night’s festivities — though not in front of the camera. Wynton Grant MUS ’17 performed as a violinist in the Oscars’ live orchestra, providing the musical backdrop for Hollywood’s biggest night. 

A sought-after multi-instrumentalist and composer, Grant has contributed to major film and television scores, including “Oppenheimer,” “Avatar: The Way of Water” and “The Mandalorian.” He has also collaborated with artists such as Lana Del Rey, Shawn Mendes and Alicia Keys. 

Grant, who received The Dean’s Prize, Yale’s highest award for excellence, was a second violinist in the Yale Philharmonia. Since his graduation, he has described himself as “equally at home in classical and pop music settings, and constantly discovering new techniques for violin performance.” In 2017, he toured Europe with Rostam, the Grammy-winning former guitarist of Vampire Weekend, as the first violinist of a string quartet. 

Colman Domingo, a former faculty member at the David Geffen School of Drama, earned a Best Actor nomination for his role in “Sing Sing,” a film that explores the lives of inmates at the notorious New York prison. Last year, Domingo was also nominated for his portrayal of civil rights activist Bayard Rustin in the film “Rustin,” which has earned critical acclaim.

The award ultimately went to Adrien Brody for “The Brutalist.”

Da’Vine Joy Randolph DRA ’11 served as a presenter at this year’s Oscars. Randolph gained widespread recognition last year after winning an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for her portrayal of a grieving mother in the dramedy“The Holdovers.”

While at Yale, Randolph performed in “The Servant of Two Masters,” which explores the comedic complexities of mistaken identity and the pursuit of self-interest. Randolph also performed in “A Portrait of the Woman as a Young Artist,” which Meg Miroshnik DRA ’11 wrote, drawing on themes from Joyce’s “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man,” Yeats’ “Leda and the Swan” and Tchaikovsky’s “Swan Lake” to depict a woman reclaiming her identity and seeking revenge.

The first Academy Awards presentation was held in 1929.