Two Georgetown alumni have received nominations for the 97th Academy Awards, including two nominations for best picture.
RaMell Ross (C’05) and Andrew Morrison (C’15) are the two College of Arts & Sciences alumni who were nominated for their work on Nickel Boys and The Brutalist, respectively. Amy Baer (C’88) also served as the executive producer of The Apprentice, which was nominated for best actor and best supporting actor.
The 97th Academy Awards ceremony will take place on March 2 at the
Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles. A full list of nominees can be found on the Academy Awards website.Meet the two Hoyas who are nominated for best picture.
RaMell Ross (C’05)
RaMell Ross (C’05) has been nominated for his work on Nickel Boys, including nominations for best picture and best adapted screenplay. Ross served as the director and screenplay writer for the movie which tells the story of two young African American men sent to a reform school in 1960s Florida.
Ross was previously nominated for an Academy Award in 2019 for best documentary feature film for his work on Hale County This Morning, This Evening.
While an Academy Award nominee today, at Georgetown, Ross once pursued an athletic path by playing on Georgetown’s men’s basketball team. But it was on the Hilltop that he found a passion for the arts, where he minored in the interarts and was exposed to many art forms from improv to painting and photography.
“I found literature at Georgetown. I found language, and I found narrative,” Ross said. “I found a desire to be creative,” he said. “[Georgetown] stoked curiosity in the world. I had friends from all over the globe. I had conversations and broke bread with people I would never have otherwise.”
Among some of his friends at Georgetown were comedian John Mulaney and actress and screenwriter Brit Marling. Ross said that through Georgetown he found a community that helped him grow as an artist.
“You can go make documentaries. You can go make a film,” he said. “There was a burgeoning if not preexisting art community that embraced me as a slight outsider. It was really cool.”
After graduating, Ross worked as a cultural envoy and special assistant to the then Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. He also played professional basketball in Northern Ireland and worked for the nonprofit Peace Players International before turning to the arts full-time.
With his Oscars nomination, Ross is excited to celebrate the accomplishment with his entire production team and share the story of the Nickel Boys.
“Best picture is as good as it gets. It’s saying that everything that every single person did in the massive collaboration that is a film is being recognized,” he said. “Most of all though, it’s pretty amazing that the Dozier School boys’ story gets elevated to this space where now someone has to encounter it if they’re encountering cinema, so that’s pretty sweet.”
Andrew Morrison (C’15)
Andrew Morrison (C’15) was nominated for an Oscar for best picture for his work as a producer on The Brutalist, which received 10 Academy Award nominations. The movie follows the story of a Jewish Holocaust survivor whose life changes after he emigrates to the U.S. and is hired by a wealthy client to design a community center.
In a previous interview with the Georgetown Entertainment & Media Alliance, Morrison said he got his first break into the film industry while he was a student at Georgetown and produced a short film that went viral and played at multiple festivals worldwide. Morrison also interned with comedian Mike Birbiglia (C’00) after his first year at Georgetown.
Throughout his undergraduate years, Morrison connected with more people in the movie industry and attended the Sundance Film Festival during his senior year, which ultimately led him to his first feature credit in Thirst Street.
He credits his English professor, John Glavin, for pushing his artistic limits.
“He encouraged me to pursue my own projects. He challenged me and doubted me in a way that made me constructively doubt myself,” Morrison said in the interview. “I remember a lot of kids dropped out of his classes because they couldn’t stand his critique and high standards. High standards are rare today, but it’s immensely important that you have them in a world that has none.”
For aspiring filmmakers, Morrison advises people to watch movies that challenge them and to be able to articulate their own perspectives. Above all, he said it’s important to have a clear vision about your goals.
“My advice is actually pretty simple: be serious about yourself and what you want to do,” he said. “In a world full of unserious people who dabble in something and then move on, or who are superficial thinkers or self-promoters or careerists, be an idiosyncratic person with a real perspective who sticks around.”
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