BUST's current cover gal Greta Gerwig earned a well-deserved Best Director Oscar nomination for her film Lady Bird this morning. With it, she becomes the fifth woman ever to be nominated for the award, following Kathryn Bigelow (The Hurt Locker, 2009), Sofia Coppola (Lost in Translation, 2003), Jane Campion (The Piano, 1993), and Lina Wertmüller (Seven Beauties, 1976) in the unfortunately short list. If she wins, she’ll become the second woman to ever win the Best Director award, following Bigelow.
That’s not the only good news. Jordan Peele is now the fifth black man to be nominated for the Best Director Oscar, following Barry Jenkins (Moonlight, 2017), Steve McQueen (12 Years a Slave, 2013), Lee Daniels (Precious, 2009), and John Singleton (Boyz n the Hood, 1991). If he wins, he’ll become the first black director to ever win the Best Director Oscar — yes, you read that right.
No women of color have ever been nominated for the Best Director Oscar. Ava DuVernay became the first black woman with a film nominated for Best PIcture with Selma in 2014, but she was not nominated for Best Director — though she absolutely should have been. Dee Rees absolutely should have been nominated this year, too, for Mudbound. So while we're celebrating Gerwig and Peele's nominations, there's still a long way to go towards equality here.
Get Out and Lady Bird are two of the best movies to come out this past year, and if you haven’t seen them yet, get on that ASAP. Get Out is currently streaming on HBO Go, and Lady Bird is still in theaters.
You can see all the Oscar nominations at Variety.
top photo: Greta Gerwig photographed by Nadya Wasylko for BUST; Jordan Peele via Peabody Awards/Wikimedia Commons
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Erika W. Smith is BUST's digital editorial director. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram @erikawynn and email her at erikawsmith@bust.com.
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