The Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay is the Academy Award (also known as an Oscar) for the best screenplay not based upon previously published material. It was created in 1940 as a separate writing award from the Academy Award for Best Story. Beginning with the Oscars for 1957, the two categories were combined to honor only the screenplay.
Screenplays are eligible if they are not based on "previously published material". The Writer's Branch of the academy determines if a screenplay is adapted or original, based on possible sources in question, interviews given about the film and the film's publicity materials, and sometimes places screenplays in a different category than the Writers Guild of America. For the 75th Academy Awards, Gangs of New York was nominated as an original screenplay despite being based on the book The Gangs of New York because the writers based the film on the book's historical research but largely invented the characters and plot.[1] For the 89th Academy Awards, Moonlight was campaigned as an original screenplay, being based on an unpublished play, but was ultimately placed in the adapted screenplay category, which it won.[2] Similarly, Whiplash was considered an adapted screenplay at the 87th Academy Awards despite being written as an original screenplay because a scene from the script was produced as a proof-of-concept short film. However, 2008's Frozen River, which similarly had a proof-of-concept short film screened at film festivals, was nominated as an original screenplay.[3]
Frances Marion (The Big House) was the first woman to win for her original script, although she won Best Writing, which then included both original and adapted screenplays before a separate award for Best Original Screenplay was introduced. Muriel Box (The Seventh Veil) was the first woman to win in this category; she shared the award with her husband, Sydney Box. They are also the first of two married couples to win in this category; Earl W. Wallace and Pamela Wallace (Witness) are the others.
Jordan Peele became the first and only African-American to win in this category for 2017's Get Out.[10]
Bong Joon-ho and Han Jin-won became the first Asian writers to win either Screenplay award, for 2019's Parasite.[11][12] This was also the most recent of 10 occasions when Oscars in this category have been awarded to writers for both screenplay AND story on one film (sometimes they have been completely different, and sometimes the credited screenplay author also contributed to the story alongside at least one other credited scribe).
Winners and nominees
Winners are listed first in the colored row and denoted by double dagger (‡), followed by the other nominees.
↑ Best Original Screenplay was consolidated in 1948 for a singular Best Screenplay award. The winner was The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, adapted from the novel of same name.
↑ In 1958, Nedrick Young was blacklisted and writing under the pseudonym Nathan E. Douglas. The Academy's Board of Governors voted in 1993 to restore Young's nomination and award.
↑ The eligibility period for the 93rd ceremony was extended through to February 28, 2021, due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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