Why was Jean Simmons not nominated for an Oscar for Elmer Gantry?

Jean was charming but the Oscar voters were idiots.

Shirley MacLaine was great in The Apartment. Taylor's nomination and win was due to a medical emergency. Jean Simmons was robbed of a nomination for Elmer Gantry - she is great in the film, as she always was.

She deserved more than 2 nominations in her career but it is still better than most actresses get. Home Before Dark was another Jean Simmons performance that should have gained her a nomination.

If not Jean, the Oscar should have gone to Deborah Kerr considering this would be her last of six nominations. They give Susan Hayward her Oscar on her fifth try just two years prior. If I'm correct, Deborah won one of the critics awards.

[quote] Deborah Kerr

Was she nominated that year?

Burt Lancaster already got the lead Oscar for Elmer gantry, that was enough for this overlong bore of a movie!

Anyone that year except for Taylor. Even Liz admitted she only won because of her health issues at the time.

R4 Yes, Deborah Kerr was nominated for The Sundowners that year. She won the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress

It's interesting that both Burt Lancaster and Shirley Jones won Oscars that year for this movie but Jean Simmons didn't even score a nomination. Only a Golden Globe nomination.

R7 Thank you

Although Simmons did receive a second nomination in 1970, by the early1960's she'd fallen out of fashion and interest had moved elsewhere. She also had problems with alcoholism.

At least that seems to be the gist of it.

I’m on my way up to Canaan Land! I’m on my way up to Canaan Land On my way oh to Canaan Land I’m on my way Glory Hallelujah I’m on my way!

R10 Looking at that thread, I agree with the poster who said that the perfect scenario would have been for Jean Simmons and Deborah Kerr to tie in 1960 since both were British besties who never ended up winning. Liz did not need to be a 2-time Oscar winner anyway.

[quote]Liz did not need to be a 2-time Oscar winner anyway.

Why not?

R13 She was not a great actress my any means. Great in the right role though. One Oscar for Virginia Woolf would have been enough. Burton should have won for his performance in Virginia Woolf as well. Would have been great to see them winning together in the same year! And so well deserved.

Don't get me wrong, I love Liz and by and all accounts one of the nicest people ever in ShowBiz. She was one of the greatest allies of the gay community and helped breakdown barriers but one competitive Oscar was enough.

A second 'career' Oscar would have been good.

"Why was Jean Simmons not nominated for an Oscar for Elmer Gantry?"

Well, like I was telling Arlene the other day, it all started when Zeppo Marx, not the famous one, the other one.

What do you mean there isn't a famous one?

Jean Simmons is like Julie Andrews.

A sweet English rose marries a longwinded, egotistical American bore.

[quote]A sweet English rose marries a longwinded, egotistical American bore.

🙄

When I think of Jean Simmons, I think of...Rita Moreno.

When I think of Jean Simmons I think of her as that young faithful Christian walking up and up 'into eternity' with her young blue-eyed Christian friend as the stirring music by Alfred Newman swells across the oh, so wide new CinemaScope screen.

[quote] Why was Jean Simmons not nominated for an Oscar for Elmer Gantry?

She deserved our sympathy for having to share the screen with that loud, shouting blowhard chewing up the scenery in that over-long movie.

That annoying blowhard seemed to think he deserved an Oscar for shouting a lot and refraining from getting his cowboy gun and shooting every one.

[quote] that loud, shouting blowhard chewing up the scenery

That blowhard performed in "Elmer Gantry" the exact same rubbish he performed in "The Rainmaker" 4 years previously.

Exactly the same.

This "official trailer' devotes itself completely to the blowhard while ignoring Kate Hepburn. Poor Jean Simmons hardly got a look-in in the repeat performance 4 years afterwards.

I generally like both Kerr and Simmons, but I thought "The Sundowners" was far from Kerr's best work, while Simmons did a beautiful job with a more interesting character.