List of posthumous Academy Award winners and nominees
 |
This list may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. (Consider using more specific cleanup instructions.) Please help improve this list if you can. The talk page may contain suggestions. (January 2009) |
 |
This list needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (January 2009) |
This is a list of posthumous Academy Award winners and nominees. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences annually presents Academy Awards in both competitive and honorary categories. This list includes posthumous winners and nominees of the Academy's competitive awards, as well as posthumous winners of its honorary awards.
The list does not include people who were retrospectively honoured with an Academy Award and were dead at the time the Academy made the decision to make the retrospective award. For example: in 1993, seventeen years after his death, Dalton Trumbo was retrospectively awarded the 1953 Oscar for Best Writing - Motion Picture Story for Roman Holiday. It had been previously awarded to Ian McLellan Hunter. However, Hunter was merely a front for Trumbo, because Trumbo was blacklisted at the time and it was not possible for his name to appear in either the film's credits or the Academy Award nomination (hence, it was not generally known that he was the real screenwriter). Trumbo did not die until 1976, and under normal circumstances he would have received this award in person in 1953; hence the Academy does not consider this a posthumous award but a correction of the record.
Similarly, the Oscar for Best Screenplay (Adaptation) for The Bridge on the River Kwai was originally awarded to Pierre Boulle, but only in 1984 corrected to honor the actual screenwriters, Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson, who were on the Hollywood blacklist at the time and could only work on the film in secret. By the time this correction was made, both Foreman and Wilson had died, but the award does not qualify for an entry in the following list.
This list is current as of the 84th Academy Awards ceremony set to be held on February 26, 2012.
[edit] Competitive awards
[edit] Honorary awards
| Name | Date of Death | Ceremony | Year | Academy Award | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Robert Benjamin | October 22, 1979 | 52nd | 1979 | Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award | |
| Les Bowie | January 27, 1979 | 51st | 1978 | Special Achievement Award (Visual Effects) for Superman | |
| Douglas Fairbanks | December 12, 1939 | 12th | 1939 | Academy Honorary Award | |
| Audrey Hepburn | January 20, 1993 | 65th | 1992 | Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award | [8] |
| George Kraemer | January 18, 1993 | 65th | 1992 | Scientific and Technical Award (Scientific and Engineering Award) | |
| Charles Miller | 13th | 1940 | Scientific or Technical Award (Class I) | ||
| Edward G. Robinson | January 26, 1973 | 45th | 1972 | Honorary Award | [9] |
| Louis Stankiewicz | 54th | 1981 | Scientific or Technical Award (Technical Achievement Award) | ||
| Geoffrey H. Williamson | January 20, 1993 | 65th | 1992 | Scientific and Technical Award (Scientific and Engineering Award) |
[edit] Notes
- ^ Ashman's partner Bill Lauch accepted the award on his behalf.
- ^ Finch became the first posthumous winner in an acting category. His widow Eletha and screenwriter Paddy Chayefsky accepted the award on his behalf.
- ^ Conrad L. Hall's son Conrad W. Hall accepted the award on his behalf.
- ^ Ledger died after completing his scenes in The Dark Knight but before the film had been completed, and a year before the nominations were announced. His family accepted the award on his behalf.
- ^ Limelight, a 1952 film, won its award in 1972 because the blacklisting of Charlie Chaplin prevented it from being shown in Los Angeles until then. (The Academy subsequently changed its rules to prevent films more than two years old from receiving awards.)
- ^ Unsworth died during the shooting of Tess, and the cinematography was completed by Ghislain Cloquet. Unsworth and Cloquet were jointly nominated, successfully, for Best Cinematography.
- ^ Zimbalist died during the filming of Ben-Hur. His widow Mary Zimbalist accepted the award on his behalf.
- ^ Hepburn died eight days after the Academy voted to confer this award, but two months before the 65th Academy Awards ceremony. Her son Sean Hepburn Ferrer accepted the award on her behalf.
- ^ Robinson died after the Academy voted to confer this award, but two months before the 45th Academy Awards ceremony. His widow Jane accepted the award on his behalf.
[edit] External links
- Oscars.org (official website for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences)
- The Academy Awards Database (official database of Academy Award winners and nominees)
- Academy Awards, USA (Academy Awards information at the Internet Movie Database)
- Filmsite.org (comprehensive Academy Awards history)
