Viola Davis vs. Amy Adams: When the 'enemy' of your 'enemy' might not be your 'friend'

Can Viola Davis' brief but acclaimed performance in "Doubt" muster enough support to pull off an upset and win the Oscar for best supporting actress... even with costar Amy Adams competing for votes in the same category?

Costars have been pitted against each other for acting Oscars since 1935, when three men from "Mutiny on the Bounty" were nominated for lead actor. This dynamic has recurred — though usually with only two actors going head-to-head — 63 times over the 80 years of the Academy Awards prior to 2008. And, as was the case with the "Mutiny on the Bounty" nominees, both competing costars went home empty-handed on 44 (70%) of those occasions.

Why? Presumably because voters couldn't agree, en masse, on which (if either) of the costars to coalesce their support behind, resulting in a split that denied either enough votes to win — even if one might have won had the other not been picking off their votes!

Can Davis compete for the Oscar with category favorite Penelope Cruz ("Vicky Cristina Barcelona") when she also has to compete with her costar?

The odds are not good, but here are a few factoids that might offer Davis some reason for hope.

• Of the 63 instances in which an actor was pitted against a costar for an Oscar, 30 (48%) were in the supporting actress category — way more than any other category. And of the 19 instances in which one managed to defeat a costar, 10 (53%) were in the supporting actress category — also way more than any other category.

• The first time someone ever defeated a costar to win an Oscar, it was Hattie McDaniel, an African-American actress who stole the few scenes in which she appeared in "Gone with the Wind," over castmate Olivia de Havilland, a bigger 'name' with more scenes in the film — and the category was best supporting actress!

• Of the 10 actresses who defeated a costar to win a supporting actress Oscar, six (60%) had, like Davis, never before been nominated (Hattie McDaniel, Celeste Holm, Cloris Leachman, Tatum O'Neal, Jessica Lange, Catherine Zeta-Jones). However, of those, only one was competing against a costar who had previously been nominated (like Adams), and that was Holm.

• Davis' biggest advocate has been her other "Doubt" costar Meryl Streep, who won her first Oscar 29 years ago by defeating a costar in the supporting actress category!

Following are complete lists that I have compiled of (A) all actors who managed to defeat a costar and (B) costars who all lost...

One won (19)

• Hattie McDaniel over Olivia de Havilland for supporting actress, "Gone With the Wind" (1939)
• Teresa Wright over May Whitty for supporting actress, "Mrs. Miniver" (1942)
• Bing Crosby over Barry Fitzgerald for lead actor, "Going My Way" (1944)
• Celeste Holm over Anne Revere for supporting actress, "Gentleman's Agreement" (1947)
• Maximilian Schell over Spencer Tracy for lead actor, "Judgment at Nuremberg" (1961)
• Helen Hayes over Maureen Stapleton for supporting actress, "Airport" (1970)
• Ben Johnson over Jeff Bridges for supporting actor, "The Last Picture Show" (1971)
• Cloris Leachman over Ellen Burstyn for supporting actress, "The Last Picture Show" (1971)
• Tatum O'Neal over Madeline Kahn for supporting actress, "Paper Moon" (1973)
• Robert De Niro over Michael V. Gazzo and Lee Strasberg for supporting actor, "The Godfather, Part II" (1974)
• Peter Finch over William Holden for lead actor, "Network" (1976)
• Jason Robards over Maximilian Schell for supporting actor, "Julia" (1977)
• Meryl Streep over Jane Alexander for supporting actress, "Kramer vs. Kramer" (1979)
• Timothy Hutton over Judd Hirsch for supporting actor, "Ordinary People" (1980)
• Jessica Lange over Teri Garr for supporting actress, "Tootsie" (1982)
• Shirley MacLaine over Debra Winger for lead actress, "Terms of Endearment" (1983)
• F. Murray Abraham over Tom Hulce for lead actor, "Amadeus" (1984)
• Dianne Wiest over Jennifer Tilly for supporting actress, "Bullets Over Broadway" (1994)
• Catherine Zeta-Jones over Queen Latifah for supporting actress, "Chicago" (2002)

All lost (44)

• Clark Gable, Charles Laughton and Franchot Tone for lead actor, "Mutiny on the Bounty" (1935)
• Harry Carey and Claude Rains for supporting actor, "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" (1939)
• Patricia Collinge and Teresa Wright for supporting actress, "The Little Foxes" (1941)
• Gladys Cooper and Anne Revere for supporting actress, "The Song of Bernadette" (1943)
• Eve Arden and Ann Blyth for supporting actress, "Mildred Pierce" (1945)
• Barbara Bel Geddes and Ellen Corby for supporting actress, "I Remember Mama" (1948)
• Celeste Holm and Elsa Lanchester for supporting actress, "Come to the Stable" (1949)
• Ethel Barrymore and Ethel Waters for supporting actress, "Pinky" (1949)
• Anne Baxter and Bette Davis for lead actress, "All About Eve" (1950)
• Celeste Holm and Thelma Ritter for supporting actress, "All About Eve" (1950)
• Leo Genn and Peter Ustinov for supporting actor, "Quo Vadis" (1951)
• Montgomery Clift and Burt Lancaster for lead actor, "From Here to Eternity" (1953)
• Brandon de Wilde and Jack Palance for supporting actor, "Shane" (1953)
• Jan Sterling and Claire Trevor for supporting actress, "The High and the Mighty" (1954)
• Lee J. Cobb, Karl Malden, and Rod Steiger for supporting actor, "On the Waterfront" (1954)
• Eileen Heckart and Patty McCormack for supporting actress, "The Bad Seed" (1956)
• James Dean and Rock Hudson for lead actor, "Giant" (1956)
• Arthur Kennedy and Russ Tamblyn for supporting actor, "Peyton Place" (1957)
• Hope Lange and Diane Varsi for supporting actress, "Peyton Place" (1957)
• Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier for lead actor, "The Defiant Ones" (1958)
• Arthur O'Connell and George C. Scott for supporting actor, "Anatomy of a Murder" (1959)
• Susan Kohner and Juanita Moore for supporting actress, "Imitation of Life" (1959)
• Katharine Hepburn and Elizabeth Taylor for lead actress, "Suddenly, Last Summer" (1959)
• Jackie Gleason and George C. Scott for supporting actor, "The Hustler" (1961)
• Diane Cilento, Edith Evans and Joyce Redman for supporting actress, "Tom Jones" (1963)
• Richard Burton and Peter O'Toole for lead actor, "Becket" (1964)
• Joyce Redman and Maggie Smith for supporting actress, "Othello" (1965)
• Gene Hackman and Michael J. Pollard for supporting actor, "Bonnie and Clyde" (1967)
• Dustin Hoffman and Jon Voight for lead actor, "Midnight Cowboy" (1969)
• Michael Caine and Laurence Olivier for lead actor, "Sleuth" (1971)
• James Caan, Robert Duvall, and Al Pacino for supporting actor, "The Godfather" (1972)
• Ronee Blakley and Lily Tomlin for supporting actress, "Nashville" (1975)
• Burgess Meredith and Burt Young for supporting actor, "Rocky" (1976)
• Anne Bancroft and Shirley MacLaine for lead actress, "The Turning Point" (1977)
• Tom Courtenay and Albert Finney for lead actor, "The Dresser" (1983)
• Margaret Avery and Oprah Winfrey for supporting actress, "The Color Purple" (1985)
• Tom Berenger and Willem Dafoe for supporting actor, "Platoon" (1986)
• Joan Cusack and Sigourney Weaver for supporting actress, "Working Girl" (1988)
• Anjelica Huston and Lena Olin for supporting actress, "Enemies: A Love Story" (1989)
• Harvey Keitel and Ben Kingsley for supporting actor, "Bugsy" (1991)
• Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon for lead actress, "Thelma and Louise" (1991)
• Kate Hudson and Frances McDormand for  supporting actress, "Almost Famous" (2000)
• Helen Mirren and Maggie Smith for supporting actress, "Gosford Park" (2001)
• Adriana Barraza and Rinko Kikuchi for supporting actress, "Babel" (2006)

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Photo: "Doubt" costars Viola Davis and Amy Adams following a special screening of the film at the academy in November 2008. Credit: Getty Images

Comments

[Leone]

I absolutely love your Oscar statistics, Scott! Such interesting reading .

[Barry]

Great analysis. I think Davis can win. I'm sensing after last year's all foreign acting winners, that some parochialism might come back into play.