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- What: 2025 Academy Awards
- Date: Sunday, March 2, 2025
- Location: Dolby Theatre at Ovation Hollywood, California
- Time: 7:00 p.m. ET
- How to Watch: ABC
The 97th edition of the Oscars takes place on Sunday, March 2, 2025. While the final nominees for the 2025 Academy Awards have yet to be named, several actors are in the early running for the Best Actor award. Among them is Adrien Brody, who won the 2003 Best Actor Oscar for “The Pianist.” At the time, Brody was 29, making him the youngest winner in the Best Actor category. In 2025, Brody will look to become the 11th man to claim multiple Best Actor Oscars. The following have won two Best Actor awards: Anthony Hopkins, Sean Penn, Frederic March, Tom Hanks, Gary Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Marlon Brando, Jack Nicholson, and Spencer Tracy. Daniel Day-Lewis is the only three-time winner of the award. Brody is expected to earn a nomination for his work in “The Brutalist.” Final nominees for the 2025 Oscars will be announced on January 17, 2025.
Last year, Cillian Murphy won the Best Actor award for his work in “Oppenheimer.” Murphy had not been nominated for the award before.
Brody is not the only Best Actor winner looking for a second award in the category. Joaquin Phoenix, who claimed the Best Actor Oscar in 2019 for his work as Arthur Fleck in “Joker.” Phoenix was also nominated for “The Master,” and “Walk the Line.” Phoenix reprised the role of Fleck for “Joker Folie A Deux.” He is in the running for a fourth Best Actor nomination.
Before looking at the betting odds and picks for the 2025 Best Actor Oscar, check out the top betting sites for Entertainment in 2024 and the betting odds for the 2025 Oscars.
2025 Best Actor betting picks
| To Win 2025 Oscar Best Actor |  |  |  |  |
| Adrien Brody - The Brutalist | -160 | EVEN | -115 | -120 |
| Colman Domingo - Sing Sing | +215 | +250 | +250 | +250 |
| Ralph Fiennes - Conclave | +275 | +350 | +350 | +250 |
| Timothée Chalamet - A Complete Unknown | +1000 | +1500 | +1500 | +800 |
| Daniel Craig - Queer | +1200 | +800 | +800 | +1000 |
| Sebastian Stan - The Apprentice | +1200 | +1500 | +1500 | +1200 |
| Joaquin Phoenix - Joker Folie A Deux | +1200 | +1800 | +1800 | +2000 |
| Paul Mescal - Gladiator II | +1400 | +1000 | +1000 | +1400 |
| Jesse Eisenberg - A Real Pain | +2500 | +2500 | +2500 | +3300 |
| Barry Keoghan - Bird | +3300 | +4000 | +3000 | +4000 |
Adrien Brody: “The Brutalist” betting breakdown
If Adrien Brody earns a nomination for his work in “The Brutalist” it will mark his first nomination since he won the Best Actor for “The Pianist.” The now 51-year-old Brody has been busy since winning the Oscar but has not picked up a nomination since then.
Brody plays Laszlo Toth, a Hungarian-born Jewish architect who has survived the ordeal of the Nazi Holocaust and then moves to America after the Second World War to restart his career. His performance received a 12-minute standing ovation at the Venice International Film Festival. The Guardian described Brody’s performance in the A24 film, which Brady Corbet directs, as such, “Toth is played with angular fierceness and passion by Adrien Brody: a career best for him, surely, and an advance on his performance in Roman Polanski’s “The Pianist.”
Brody is the early betting favorite to win the Best Actor Oscar.
Colman Domingo: “Sing Sing” betting breakdown
Colman Domingo earned his first Best Actor nomination in 2024 for his work as Bayard Rustin in George C. Wolfe’s “Rustin.” Domingo did not win the Oscar for that performance. Pundits expect him to earn a second consecutive nomination for his performance in “Sing Sing.” Domingo plays Divine G in the film. He is part of a group of men in the notorious Sing Sing prison who are participating in a theater arts program. The film is based on a 2005 article in Esquire called “The Sing Sing Follies,” which John H. Richardson wrote. Several members of the cast of the A24 film, which Greg Kwedar directed, are alumni of the Sing Sing program.
Filmspeak wrote of Domingo’s performance, “Hiring a major actor to portray Divine G might have been a mistake, especially because the man himself appears in the movie. However, one can’t overstate just how magnifying Colman Domingo is here, and it may very well be the best performance of his career, one rife with emotional complexity at every turn. It’s also far more introspective and soul-crushing than his Oscar-nominated portrayal of Bayard Rustin in George C. Wolfe’s “Rustin” last year.
Ralph Fiennes: “Conclave” betting breakdown
Ralph Fiennes picked up his first and only Best Actor nomination in 1996 for his work in “The English Patient.” Fiennes did not win the Oscar that year, losing to Geoffrey Rush for “Shine.” The veteran performer has one other Academy Award nomination, in 1993. That year he was up for Best Supporting Actor for “Schindler’s List.” Fiennes lost that award to Tommy Lee Jones for “The Fugitive.” The 61-year-old Fiennes is a betting favorite to be nominated this year for his work in “Conclave,” which is directed by Edward Berger. Conclave is a drama about the process of electing a new pope.
Dan Skip Allen wrote of Fiennes’ performance, “Fiennes gives a very nuanced and subtle performance in this movie. He also has some moments where he has to flex his muscles against others in the cast. He brings his A-game in this role. He’s overdue for an Academy Award and I think he has a very good chance of winning one in this role. He was incredible and I was glued to every word he said on screen.”
Best Bet 2025 Best Actor Oscar
While Adrien Brody is the early betting favorite for the Best Actor Oscar, there’s not much betting value when it comes to Brody. With that in mind, the better betting pick is Ralph Fiennes.
The betting pick to win the Best Actor Oscar is Ralph Fiennes.
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