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‘Nomadland’ Director Chloé Zhao Has Already Made Awards Show History

Photo credit: Amanda Edwards - Getty Images
Photo credit: Amanda Edwards - Getty Images

Despite controversial snubs, awards season this year presented a refreshing series of firsts, in part thanks to Nomadland director Chloé Zhao. Zhao is up for Best Director at the 2021 Oscars, making history as the first woman of color to pick up a nomination in the category.

Between this achievement, Barack Obama’s stamp of approval, and her huge Marvel project starring Angelina Jolie, 2021 is shaping up to be a great year for Zhao. Read on for more intel on what she’s accomplished and where you can catch her work next.

Photo credit: Amanda Edwards - Getty Images
Photo credit: Amanda Edwards - Getty Images

First and foremost, you should know about Zhao’s films.

Chloé Zhao films are famous for capturing the American West in an almost documentary-like style. Of her entire catalog, Rotten Tomatoes doesn’t rank a single Zhao movie lower than 91 percent, which is a feat in and of itself.

Before Nomadland became a staple of the 2020 to 2021 awards season, Zhao was best known for directing Songs My Brothers Taught Me, Daughters, and the 2017 western The Rider, which won Best Feature at the Gotham Independent Film Awards and made Barack Obama’s list of favorite films in 2018.

Tell me more about Zhao’s Nomadland.

Nomadland is the most critically lauded film of Zhao’s career thus far. Zhao based her film off of journalist Jessica Bruder’s 2017 nonfiction book Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century and cast Oscar winner Frances McDormand as Fern, a widow who lives in small-town Nevada and grapples with the town’s gypsum plant closing, which shutters everything.

“We all go through our own personal apocalypse at some point,” Zhao told Rolling Stone while talking about Nomadland’s characters. “We’re forced to fight and sometimes to redefine ourselves, because everything that defined who we are is gone…The ability for perseverance, to find a new life and sense of self—that, to me, is the human spirit.”

Has Zhao ever won an Oscar before?

She has not! The 2021 Academy Awards mark her first-ever nominations, for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Film Editing. Zhao makes history as the first-ever woman of color to garner a Best Director nomination at the Oscars.

What’s next for her?

Zhao’s next project is a lofty one: She’ll join the Marvel franchise by directing the movie Eternals, starring Salma Hayek, Angelina Jolie, Gemma Chan, Kit Harington, Kumail Nanjiani, and Richard Madden, so yeah, the cast is stacked.

Here’s the premise: “The saga of the Eternals, a race of immortal beings who lived on Earth and shaped its history and civilizations.”

That is…not a lot of information! Thankfully, the movie will be based on Jack Kirby’s ’70s Eternals comic (recently adapted by Neil Gaiman), so there is source material to peruse if you’re extra curious.

Zhao’s Eternals movie is set to debut on November 5, so mark your calendars accordingly.

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