A new Oscar category will be introduced for actors at the 2026 Academy Awards – The Hollywood Reporter

David Rubin, the first casting director to be elected president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, speaks at the 2019 Governors Awards.

Valerie Macon/AFP/Getty Images

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced that it will soon begin presenting an annual Academy Award for casting. The award, which will be presented for the first time in 2026, will be the first new Oscar to be presented since the organization began presenting Best Animated Feature in 2002, after announcing its creation in 2001.

This announcement comes as a surprise, given the pressure the Academy has felt, especially in recent years, to standardize the number of categories it offers on its ABC television broadcast, in order to retain the largest possible number of viewers. (It has not yet been confirmed that the Oscars will be presented via telecast, but it is hard to imagine that it will not be.) Twenty-three awards are currently being given out on air, although the average viewer tends to pay attention to them. Only four or five.

On the other hand, the Academy has increasingly embraced casting directors in recent years. Casting professionals have belonged to the organization for decades, but were classified as at-large members until 2013, when the organization created a branch for casting directors. Six years later, the casting director was elected president of the Academy for the first time; David Rubin He held the position from 2019 to 2022. Today, there are 158 active members of the Casting Directors Chapter, making it the smallest of the Academy's 19 chapters.

In a statement issued Thursday, the current academy president said Janet Yang And CEO Bill Kramer “Casting directors play an essential role in filmmaking, and as the Academy grows, we are proud to add casting to the disciplines we recognize and celebrate,” he announced. “We congratulate the members of our Casting Directors Branch on this exciting accomplishment and for their commitment and diligence throughout this process.”

The Three Governors of the Academy's Casting Directors Branch – Richard Hicks, Kim Taylor Coleman And Debra Zinn He added: “On behalf of the members of the Casting Directors Chapter, we would like to thank the Board of Governors, Awards Committee and Academy leadership for their support. This award is well-deserved recognition of the exceptional talents of our Casting Directors and a testament to the dedicated efforts of our Chapter.”

Category rules for eligibility and voting for the inaugural award will be announced in April 2025 as part of the rules for the full 98th Academy Awards. Details of the award presentation will be determined by the Academy’s Board of Governors and administrative leadership at a later date.