‘La La Land’ hits a wrong note in Screen Actors Guild noms

LOS ANGELES: The rising chorus for “La La Land” is suddenly missing a very conspicuous note.
The 23rd annual Screen Actors Guild nominations, announced Wednesday in West Hollywood, California, included nominations for the leads of Damien Chazelle’s acclaimed musical, Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling. But the perceived Oscar front-runner was notably absent in the SAGs’ top category, best ensemble.
“La La Land,” which landed a leading seven Golden Globe nominations on Monday, had seemingly been marching toward best-picture winner. Granted, “La La Land,” largely focused on its leads, doesn’t scream ensemble. But if it goes on to win best picture, it will be the only the second to do so without a SAG ensemble nod in the category’s history. Only Mel Gibson’s “Braveheart” managed it 20 years ago. Actors, the largest group in the Academy of Motion Pictures, hold considerable sway. (SAG, though, is much larger, with about 160,000 members, compared to about 1,200 actors in the academy.)
The best ensemble nominees were Barry Jenkins’ coming-of-age tale “Moonlight,” Kenneth Lonergan’s Massachusetts family drama “Manchester by the Sea,” the rousing NASA drama “Hidden Figures” and, in a surprise, the Viggo Mortensen-led bohemian romp “Captain Fantastic.”
“Have never been happier in my career about any nomination,” said Mortensen, also nominated for best actor.
“Manchester by the Sea” led all films with four nominations, including best actor for Casey Affleck.
Individual film SAG nominees have historically aligned about four-out-of-five with Oscar acting categories. The other lead actor nominees were Viggo Mortensen (“Captain Fantastic”), Denzel Washington (“Fences“) and Andrew Garfield (“Hacksaw Ridge“).
Up for best actress alongside Stone are Amy Adams (“Arrival“), Natalie Portman (“Jackie“), Meryl Streep (“Florence Foster Jenkins“) and, in a real twist, Emily Blunt, star of the tepidly reviewed “The Girl on the Train.”