List of African Academy Award winners and nominees

This is a list of African Academy Award winners and nominees, which includes both ethnic African people born and/or raised in Africa and non-ethnic Africans born and raised in Africa.

Best Actor

Best Actor in a Leading Role
Year	Name	Country	Film	Role	Status	Milestone / Notes
1959	Laurence Harvey		Room at the Top	Joe Lampton	Nominated	First Lithuanian nominated for an Oscar. Born in Lithuania, but educated and raised in South Africa, where he joined the army.

Best Actress

Best Actress in a Leading Role
Year	Name	Country	Film	Role	Status	Milestone / Notes
1971	Janet Suzman		Nicholas and Alexandra	Alexandra Feodorovna	Nominated
2003	Charlize Theron		Monster	Aileen Wuornos	Won	First African to win in an acting category.
2005			North Country	Josey Aimes	Nominated
2016	Ruth Negga		Loving	Mildred Loving	Nominated
2019	Charlize Theron		Bombshell	Megyn Kelly	Nominated

Best Supporting Actor

Best Actor in a Supporting Role
Year	Name	Country	Film	Role	Status	Milestone / Notes
1936	Basil Rathbone		Romeo and Juliet	Tybalt	Nominated	Rathbone was a South African-born British actor.
1938			If I Were King	King Louis XI	Nominated
1948	Cecil Kellaway		The Luck of the Irish	Horace	Nominated
1962	Omar Sharif		Lawrence of Arabia	Sherif Ali	Nominated	First African to be nominated for an Academy Award in any category.
1967	Cecil Kellaway		Guess Who's Coming to Dinner	Monsignor Mike Ryan	Nominated
2003	Djimon Hounsou		In America	Mateo	Nominated	First Black African to be nominated for an acting award.
2006			Blood Diamond	Solomon Vandy	Nominated
2013	Barkhad Abdi		Captain Phillips	Abduwali Muse	Nominated
2018	Richard E. Grant		Can You Ever Forgive Me?	Jack Hock	Nominated	Grant is from a white British family; he was born and raised in Swaziland.

Best Supporting Actress

Best Actress in a Supporting Role
Year	Name	Country	Film	Role	Status	Milestone / Notes
2013	Lupita Nyong'o		12 Years a Slave	Patsey	Won	First black African woman to be nominated and win in any category.

Best Cinematography

Best Cinematography
Year	Name	Country	Film	Status	Milestone / Notes
1966	Ted Moore		A Man for All Seasons	Won	Moore is a South African-born British. Won for Best Color Cinematography.
1991	Stephen Goldblatt		The Prince of Tides	Nominated	Goldblatt is a South African-born British.
1995			Batman Forever	Nominated
2002	Dion Beebe		Chicago	Nominated	Beebe is a South African-born Australian.
2005			Memoirs of a Geisha	Won

Best Director

Best Director
Year	Name	Country	Film	Status	Milestone / Notes
1996	Scott Hicks		Shine	Nominated	Hicks is a Ugandan-born Australian.
1997	Atom Egoyan		The Sweet Hereafter	Nominated	Egoyan is an Egyptian-born Canadian filmmaker.

Best Documentary Feature

Best Documentary Feature
Year	Name	Country	Film	Status	Milestone / Notes
1997	Michele Ohayon (director)		Colors Straight Up	Nominated
2012	Malik Bendjelloul		Searching for Sugar Man	Won
2013	Jehane Noujaim (director) Karim Amer (producer)		The Square	Nominated
2020	Pippa Ehrlich (director) James Reed (director) Craig Foster (producer)		My Octopus Teacher	Won
2023	Moses Bwayo Christopher Sharp [1]		Bobi Wine: The People's President	Nominated	Shared with John Battsek
	Kaouther Ben Hania		Four Daughters	Nominated	Shared with Nadim Cheikhrouha

Best Film Editing

Best Film Editing
Year	Name	Country	Film	Status	Milestone / Notes
1970	Thelma Schoonmaker		Woodstock	Nominated	Schoonmaker is from a white American family; she was born in Algeria.
1980			Raging Bull	Won
1990			Goodfellas	Nominated
2002			Gangs of New York	Nominated
2004			The Aviator	Won
2006			The Departed	Won
2011			Hugo	Nominated
2015	Margaret Sixel		Mad Max: Fury Road	Won	Sixel is a South African-born Australian.
2019	Thelma Schoonmaker		The Irishman	Nominated
2023			Killers of the Flower Moon	Nominated

Best International Feature Film

The Academy Award for Best International Feature Film is awarded to a country, not to an individual, and the submitting country is the officially designated nominee in this category.

Best International Feature Film
Year	Country	Film	Director	Status	Milestone / Notes
1969		Z	Costa-Gavras	Won	First African film to win an Academy Award.
1976		Black and White in Color	Jean-Jacques Annaud	Won
1983		Le Bal	Ettore Scola	Nominated
1995		Dust of Life	Rachid Bouchareb	Nominated
2004		Yesterday	Darrell Roodt	Nominated
2005		Tsotsi	Gavin Hood	Won	First African film in a language other than French to win in this category.
2006		Days of Glory	Rachid Bouchareb	Nominated
2010		Outside the Law		Nominated
2014		Timbuktu	Abderrahmane Sissako	Nominated
2020		The Man Who Sold His Skin	Kaouther Ben Hania	Nominated

Best Live Action Short Film

Best Live Action Short Film
Year	Name	Country	Film	Status	Milestone / Notes
2019	Meryam Joobeur		Brotherhood	Nominated	Joobeur is Tunisian-born Canadian. Shared with Maria Gracia Turgeon.
2023	Misan Harriman		The After	Nominated	Harriman is Nigerian-born British. Shared with Nicky Bentham.
2024	Cindy Lee (director)		The Last Ranger	Nominated	Shared with Darwin Shaw

Best Makeup and Hairstyling

Best Makeup and Hairstyling
Year	Name	Country	Film	Status	Milestone / Notes
1999	Trefor Proud		Topsy-Turvy	Won	Proud is the first Zimbabwean to win an Academy Award in this category. Shared with Christine Blundell.
2019	Tristan Versluis		1917	Nominated	Versluis is a Zimbabwean-born English. Shared with Naomi Donne and Rebecca Cole.

Best Music, Original Score

Best Original Score
Year	Name	Country	Film	Status	Milestone / Notes
1985	Caiphus Semenya		The Color Purple	Nominated
1987	Jonas Gwangwa		Cry Freedom	Nominated

Best Music, Original Song

Best Original Song
Year	Name	Country	Film	Song	Status	Milestone / Notes
1987	Jonas Gwangwa		Cry Freedom	"Cry Freedom"	Nominated	Shared with George Fenton.
2012	Herbert Kretzmer		Les Misérables	"Suddenly"	Nominated	Kretzmer is from a Jewish family. Shared with Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg.
2022	Tems		Black Panther: Wakanda Forever	"Lift Me Up"	Nominated	Shared with Rihanna, Ludwig Göransson, and Ryan Coogler.

Best Writing (Adapted Screenplay)

Best Adapted Screenplay
Year	Name	Country	Film	Adapted From	Status	Milestone / Notes
1983	Ronald Harwood		The Dresser	The Dresser by Ronald Harwood	Nominated
1987	Mark Peploe		The Last Emperor	From Emperor to Citizen: The Autobiography of Aisin-Gioro Pu Yi by Henry Pu Yi	Won	Peploe is a Kenyan-born English writer. Shared with Bernardo Bertolucci.
1997	Atom Egoyan		The Sweet Hereafter	The Sweet Hereafter by Russell Banks	Nominated
2002	Ronald Harwood		The Pianist	The Pianist by Władysław Szpilman	Won
2007			The Diving Bell and the Butterfly	The Diving Bell and the Butterfly by Jean-Dominique Bauby	Nominated
2009	Neill Blomkamp		District 9	Alive in Joburg by Neill Blomkamp	Nominated	Shared with Terri Tatchell.

Best Writing (Original Screenplay)

Best Original Screenplay
Year	Name	Country	Film	Status	Milestone / Notes
1996	Scott Hicks		Shine	Nominated	Hicks is a Ugandan-born Australian. Shared with Jan Sardi.

See also

• List of Asian Academy Award winners and nominees
• List of black Academy Award winners and nominees
• List of Puerto Rican Academy Award winners and nominees

References

1. Sciences, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and. "Christopher Sharp and Moses Bwayo: 5 Must-See Documentaries". A.frame. Retrieved 2024-03-17.