Producers Guild Award Nominations 2015

The nominations for Producers Guild Awards were just announced. One of the most important (obviously!) awards bodies, the PGA awards excellence in film production or in other words, best picture. This year the nominees range from Boyhood, Birdman, The Imitation Game, Whiplash, The Grand Budapest Hotel to Foxcatcher, American Sniper and Nightcrawler. Of course, Gone Girl and The Theory of Everything as well. The biggest shock of this list would be no Selma and to some smaller extent, Unbroken. I wasn't expecting Foxcatcher or Nightcrawler to make it but I welcome their inclusions. The latter has become a Guild's darling apart from the deserved critical awards acceptance it has received. The former too got some notices from guilds so far and I have been skeptical about it after the rather cold shoulder it has been given by the critics. American Sniper? Well, Eastwood! The rest were obvious predictions. Now the exclusion of Selma here has me worried. This happened after ACE Eddie also excluded it from their nominations, an important guild.

Below is the full list of nominees:

- American Sniper (Warner Bros. Pictures)
Producers: Bradley Cooper, p.g.a., Clint Eastwood, p.g.a., Andrew Lazar, p.g.a., Robert Lorenz, p.g.a., Peter Morgan, p.g.a.

- Birdman (Fox Searchlight Pictures)
Producers: Alejandro G. Iñárritu, John Lesher, James W. Skotchdopole


- Boyhood (IFC Films)
Producers: Richard Linklater, p.g.a., Cathleen Sutherland, p.g.a.

- Foxcatcher (Sony Pictures Classics)
Producers: Megan Ellison, p.g.a., Jon Kilik, p.g.a., Bennett Miller, p.g.a.

- Gone Girl (20th Century Fox)
Producer: Ceán Chaffin, p.g.a.

- The Grand Budapest Hotel (Fox Searchlight Pictures)
Producers: Wes Anderson & Scott Rudin, Jeremy Dawson, Steven Rales

- The Imitation Game (The Weinstein Company)
Producers: Nora Grossman, p.g.a., Ido Ostrowsky, p.g.a., Teddy Schwarzman, p.g.a.

- Nightcrawler (Open Road Films)
Producers: Jennifer Fox, Tony Gilroy

- The Theory of Everything (Focus Features)
Producers: Tim Bevan & Eric Fellner, Lisa Bruce, Anthony McCarten

- Whiplash (Sony Pictures Classics)
Producers: Jason Blum, Helen Estabrook, David Lancaster

Outstanding Producer of Animated Theatrical Motion Pictures:

- Big Hero 6 (Walt Disney Animation Studios)
Producer: Roy Conli, p.g.a.

- The Book of Life (20th Century Fox)
Producers: Brad Booker, p.g.a., Guillermo del Toro, p.g.a.

- The Boxtrolls (Focus Features)
Producers: David Bleiman Ichioka, p.g.a., Travis Knight, p.g.a.

- How To Train Your Dragon 2 (20th Century Fox)
Producer: Bonnie Arnold, p.g.a.

- The LEGO Movie (Warner Bros. Pictures)
Producer: Dan Lin

Outstanding Producer of Documentary Theatrical Motion Pictures:

- The Green Prince (Music Box Films)
Producers: John Battsek, Simon Chinn, Nadav Schirman

- Life Itself (Magnolia Pictures)
Producers: Garrett Basch, Steve James, Zak Piper

- Merchants of Doubt (Sony Pictures Classics)
Producers: Robert Kenner, Melissa Robledo

- Particle Fever (Abramorama/BOND 360)
Producers: David E. Kaplan, Mark A. Levinson, Andrea Miller, Carla Solomon

- Virunga (Netflix)
Producers: Joanna Natasegara, Orlando von Einsiedel