Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress
The 2026 recipient: Amy Madigan
Presented by	Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS)
Country	United States
First awarded	March 4, 1937; 89 years ago (1937-03-04) (for films released in 1936)
Currently held by	Amy Madigan, Weapons (2025)

The Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress is a special prize given out every year by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS). This award celebrates an actress who has given an amazing performance in a supporting role in a movie released that year. The award has been given out since the 9th Academy Awards for films from 1936.

The winner of this award is usually announced by the previous year's Best Supporting Actor winner. However, more recently, past Best Supporting Actress winners have taken on this role. For the first few years, winners received plaques instead of the famous Oscar statuette. The golden statuettes were given to winners in all categories starting from the 16th Academy Awards.

This award has been given 89 times to 87 different actresses. The very first winner was Gale Sondergaard for her role in Anthony Adverse (1936). The most recent winner is Amy Madigan for her role as Gladys in Weapons (2025).

Some actresses have won more than once! Dianne Wiest and Shelley Winters each hold the record for most wins in this category, with two awards each. Other winners have won once. Thelma Ritter has been nominated the most times, with six nominations, but she has not won yet. Amy Adams has also been nominated five times.

A truly historic moment happened in 1940 when Hattie McDaniel became the first person of color to win an Oscar in any category. She won for her performance as Mammy in Gone with the Wind (1939).

Tatum O'Neal holds the record for being the youngest person to win a competitive acting Oscar. She was only 10 years old when she won for her role in Paper Moon (1973). Another interesting record belongs to Beatrice Straight. Her performance in Network (1976) was the shortest to win an Oscar, lasting just five minutes and two seconds on screen! Amy Madigan also set a record for the longest gap between Oscar nominations for an actress, with 40 years between her nomination for Twice in a Lifetime (1985) and her recent win for Weapons (2025).

How Actresses Are Nominated and Winners Are Chosen

The actors who are members of AMPAS choose the nominees for this award. They use a special voting system to pick the best performances. Then, all eligible members of the Academy vote to decide the winner. The winner is chosen by who gets the most votes.

Gale Sondergaard was the first winner for Anthony Adverse (1936).

Alice Brady won for In Old Chicago (1938).

Fay Bainter won for Jezebel (1938).

Hattie McDaniel won for Gone with the Wind (1939); the first black person to win an Oscar.

Jane Darwell won for The Grapes of Wrath (1940).

Mary Astor won for The Great Lie (1941).

Teresa Wright won for Mrs. Miniver (1942).

Katina Paxinou won for For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943).

Ethel Barrymore won for None but the Lonely Heart (1944).

Anne Revere won for National Velvet (1945).

Anne Baxter won for The Razor's Edge (1946).

Celeste Holm won for Gentleman's Agreement (1947).

Claire Trevor won for Key Largo (1948).

Mercedes McCambridge won for All the King's Men (1949).

Josephine Hull won for Harvey (1950).

Kim Hunter won for A Streetcar Named Desire (1951).

Gloria Grahame won for The Bad and the Beautiful (1952).

Donna Reed won for From Here to Eternity (1953).

Eva Marie Saint won for On the Waterfront (1954).

Jo Van Fleet won for East of Eden (1955).

Dorothy Malone won for Written on the Wind (1956).

Miyoshi Umeki won for Sayonara (1957); the first East Asian acting winner.

Wendy Hiller won for Separate Tables (1958).

Shelley Winters won twice, for The Diary of Anne Frank (1959) and A Patch of Blue (1965).

Shirley Jones won for Elmer Gantry (1960).

Rita Moreno won for West Side Story (1961); the first Latina winner.

Patty Duke won for The Miracle Worker (1962).

Margaret Rutherford won for The V.I.P.s (1963).

Lila Kedrova won for Zorba the Greek (1964).

Sandy Dennis won for Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966).

Estelle Parsons won for Bonnie and Clyde (1967).

Ruth Gordon won for Rosemary's Baby (1968).

Goldie Hawn won for Cactus Flower (1969).

Helen Hayes won for Airport (1970).

Cloris Leachman won for The Last Picture Show (1971).

Eileen Heckart won for Butterflies Are Free (1972).

Tatum O'Neal won for Paper Moon (1973); the youngest winner of a competitive Oscar.

Ingrid Bergman won for Murder on the Orient Express (1974).

Lee Grant won for Shampoo (1975).

Beatrice Straight won for Network (1976); shortest performance ever to win.

Vanessa Redgrave won for Julia (1977).

Maggie Smith won for California Suite (1978).

Meryl Streep won for Kramer vs. Kramer (1979).

Mary Steenburgen won for Melvin (and Howard) (1980).

Maureen Stapleton won for Reds (1981).

Jessica Lange won for Tootsie (1982).

Linda Hunt won for portraying a male character with dwarfism in The Year of Living Dangerously (1983).

Peggy Ashcroft won for A Passage to India (1984); this category's oldest winner.

Anjelica Huston won for Prizzi's Honor (1985).

Dianne Wiest won twice, for Hannah and Her Sisters (1986) and Bullets Over Broadway (1994).

Olympia Dukakis won for Moonstruck (1987).

Winners of the Best Supporting Actress Award

The Academy Awards are given for films released in the previous calendar year. For example, the 9th Academy Awards in 1937 honored films from 1936.

1930s Winners and Nominees

1940s Winners

1950s Winners

1960s Winners

1970s Winners

1980s Winners

1990s Winners

2000s Winners

2010s Winners

2020s Winners

Actresses with Multiple Wins and Nominations

Some actresses have been recognized by the Academy more than once! Here are the individuals who have won the Best Supporting Actress award two times:

Many actresses have received multiple nominations for this award. Here are some of the most nominated:

Age Records for Winners and Nominees

The Academy Awards have seen winners and nominees of many different ages. Here are some of the records for the Best Supporting Actress category:

Multiple Character Wins

Sometimes, the same character from different movies can lead to an Oscar win!

• Anita from West Side Story (won by Rita Moreno, 1961) and West Side Story (won by Ariana DeBose, 2021)
• Sofia from The Color Purple (nominated Oprah Winfrey, 1985) and The Color Purple (nominated Danielle Brooks, 2023)

Images for kids

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  Geena Davis won for The Accidental Tourist (1988).

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  Brenda Fricker won for My Left Foot (1989).

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  Whoopi Goldberg won for Ghost (1990).

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  Mercedes Ruehl won for The Fisher King (1991).

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  Marisa Tomei won for My Cousin Vinny (1992).

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  Anna Paquin won for The Piano (1993).

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  Mira Sorvino won for Mighty Aphrodite (1995).

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  Juliette Binoche won for The English Patient (1996).

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  Kim Basinger won for L.A. Confidential (1997).

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  Judi Dench won for Shakespeare in Love (1998).

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  Angelina Jolie won for Girl, Interrupted (1999).

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  [Marcia Gay Harden]] won for Pollock (2000).

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  Jennifer Connelly won for A Beautiful Mind (2001).

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  Catherine Zeta-Jones won for Chicago (2002).

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  Renée Zellweger won for Cold Mountain (2003).

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  Cate Blanchett won for The Aviator (2004).

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  Rachel Weisz won for The Constant Gardener (2005).

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  [Jennifer Hudson]] won for Dreamgirls (2006).

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  Tilda Swinton won for Michael Clayton (2007).

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  Penélope Cruz won for Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008).

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  Mo'Nique won for Precious (2009).

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  Melissa Leo won for The Fighter (2010).

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  Octavia Spencer won for The Help (2011).

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  Anne Hathaway won for Les Misérables (2012).

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  Lupita Nyong'o won for 12 Years a Slave (2013).

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  Patricia Arquette won for Boyhood (2014).

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  Alicia Vikander won for The Danish Girl (2015).

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  Viola Davis won for Fences (2016).

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  Allison Janney won for I, Tonya (2017).

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  Regina King won for If Beale Street Could Talk (2018).

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  Laura Dern won for Marriage Story (2019).

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  Yuh-jung Youn won for Minari (2020); first Korean-dialogue win.

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  Ariana DeBose won for West Side Story (2021); first Latina winner.

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  Jamie Lee Curtis won for Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022).

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  Da'Vine Joy Randolph won for The Holdovers (2023).

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  Zoe Saldaña won for Emilia Pérez (2024).

See also

In Spanish: Anexo:Óscar a la mejor actriz de reparto para niños

• All Academy Award acting nominees
• BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role
• Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Female
• Critics' Choice Movie Award for Best Supporting Actress
• Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture
• Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role
• Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor