Speaking of Dunkirk, I caught up with a very happy Christopher Nolan at the Govs Ball and showed off my lunch box. His brilliant WWII epic took three Oscars, earning him many shout-outs from winners onstage. It was the second-best haul of the night after Shape’s four, even though there was disappointment that Hoyte van Hoytema’s cinematography wasn’t one of them. “So what’s gonna win next year?” Nolan asked me half-jokingly. He predicted Black Panther will be among the Best Picture nominees in 2019, which would make it the first comic-book movie to break that ceiling with the Academy.
I reminded him that it was because of The Dark Knight’s exclusion that the Academy went to 10 (and now up to 10) nominees to get movies like that included, but to no avail so far.
A top Disney exec told me flat out that they would be campaigning not only Black Panther for the big prize but also the upcoming Mary Poppins Returns (from director Rob Marshall), which he was raving about, particularly for star Emily Blunt.