The climax of awards season is upon us

Connie Evans, PA Entertainment Reporter

Thu, 9 March 2023 at 4:16 pm GMT

Zach Braff has said he always had Florence Pugh in mind for his latest film, A Good Person, and wanted to “base” it around his former partner.

The 47-year-old actor and filmmaker has written and directed the upcoming movie, which stars 27-year-old Pugh in the lead role and explores the impact of the opioid crisis in America.

Speaking to the PA news agency on the red carpet at the UK premiere of A Good Person on Wednesday, Braff said: “That was part of the initial inspiration for the film, was writing with Florence.

“And I wrote during the pandemic and there are a couple of themes I wanted to write about, and I wanted to base it around Florence.”

Braff and Pugh were first romantically linked in 2019, but Pugh, who previously defended the pair’s 21-year age gap, confirmed they were no longer in a relationship last year.

Braff, the star of TV medical comedy Scrubs, also explained how he drew on his own experiences of grief when writing the film, which follows Allison whose life collapses after she survives a car accident, which kills her fiance and his sister.

“It was the pandemic, and it was time to write something and my own experience with grief is kind of what bubbled up and that’s what I wanted to write about”, he said.

“It was just kind of there in front of me and that seemed like the logical thing.”

Meanwhile Pugh, who also produced the film, praised Braff’s writing style, telling PA: “He’s very, very good at writing unbelievably serious life situations, whilst partnered with some amazingly human hilarious one liners and I think that is how we live.

“We do go through life with dark things that we need to face, and we also laugh along with our family or friends at the same time.

“It’s human to find humour in even the darkest of times.”

The actress also spoke about the preparatory work she undertook to portrayal the role of Allison, who becomes addicted to prescription drugs.

“We spoke to people, we did lots of research and really tried to make it as authentic and as real and as human as possible,” she said.

Pugh added: “The mental prep is asking and talking and making sure that you’re in the right conversations, making sure that you’re taking notes, understanding how people get into these situations how it’s not black and white, and this can happen to anyone.

“And actually, it’s more to do with the physicality that I felt was necessary, of studying how it hurts, how it actually hurts the body every single day. So I took a lot of seriousness in studying that.”

A Good Person is in cinemas from 24 March and on Sky Cinema from 28 April.

Oscars 2023: When are the 95th Academy Awards?

The climax of awards season is upon us

Katie Archer and Simon Bland

Thu, 9 March 2023 at 11:52 am GMT

The 2023 Oscars are taking place this weekend, and organisers will be hoping to hit the headlines for all the right reasons this year.

In 2022, the ceremony was dominated by best actor winner Will Smith getting up on stage and slapping host Chris Rock after taking offence at a joke about his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith.

But what will everyone be talking about this year, and who is up for an award?

When is the Oscars 2023 being held?

The 95th Academy Awards, also known as the Oscars 2023, will be held on 12 March.

As usual, the ceremony will take place at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood.

How can I watch the Oscars 2023?

Keen UK film fans hoping to watch the ceremony as it unfolds will have a late night ahead of them, as the awards will be announced through the night while they take place in West Coast US.

The ceremony kicks off in the evening in Hollywood, meaning that UK viewers will need to be awake at 1am to watch who the winners are.

Sky is the broadcast partner in the UK again, and is expected to air the ceremony on Sky Cinema. Fans can stream the ceremony through NOW with a Sky Cinema Memberhip.

Who is nominated for an award this year?

The nominations for this year’s awards were announced on Tuesday, 24 January.

Sci-fi comedy Everything Everywhere All At Once leads the pack with 11 nominations including Best Picture and four acting nominations, while All Quiet On The Western Front and The Banshees of Inisherin follow with nine each.

Top Gun: Maverick received six nominations in total, although Tom Cruise missed out on a Best Actor nod, while Avatar: The Way of Water received four including one for Best Picture.

Cate Blanchett (Tar), Ana De Armas (Blonde), Andrea Riseborough (To Leslie), Michelle Willaims (The Fabelmans) and Michelle Yeoh (Everything Everywhere All At Once) are competing for Best Actress.

Austin Butler (Elvis) Colin Farrell (The Banshees of Inisherin), Brendan Fraser (The Whale), Paul Mescal (Aftersun) and Bill Nighy (Living) are in the mix for Best Actor.

Who is hosting the Oscars this year?

After trialling a trio of hosts in 2022, with Regina Hall, Amy Schumer, and Wanda Sykes sharing duties, chat show host Jimmy Kimmel taking over proceedings this time.

The Academy should be in safe hands with Kimmel as he has previously hosted the ceremony in 2017 and 2018.

He is also an old hand as awards host for the Emmys, which he hosted in 2012, 2016 and 2020.

Who are the musical performers at the 2023 Oscars?

No Oscar ceremony would be complete without a few musical numbers and this year, Lenny Kravitz, Dianne Warren, David Byrne and Rhianna are among the many musicians confirmed to perform on the big night.

Kravitz’s performance will accompany the show’s ‘In Memorium’ section where the Academy pays tribute to the stars that we have sadly lost over the past year.

Meanwhile, live performances of each of the Oscar-nominated tracks from this year’s ‘Best Original Song’ category are also set to light up the Dolby Theatre.

Viewers can expect renditions of “Nattu Nattu” from action epic RRR by performers Rahul Sipligunj and Kaala Bhairava in their Oscar debut, “This is a Life” by Byrne, Stephanie Hsu and music trio Son Lux from awards frontrunner Everything, Everywhere All At Once, “Lift Me Up” from Marvel’s Black Pantha: Wakanda Forever performed by Rhihanna and Warren and Sofia Carson performing “Applause” from 2022’s Tell It Like A Woman.

While Lady Gaga was also due to make an appearance with her Oscar-nominated song “Hold My Hand” taken from box office catnip Top Gun: Maverick, she recently confirmed that she’ll be unable to perform due to shooting commitments on Todd Phillips’ upcoming Joker sequel, Joker: Folie à Deux.

Who will present the awards at the 2023 Oscars?

Winners aside, part of the (sometimes awkward) joy of watching any Academy Awards ceremony is seeing how different celebrity presenters choose to reveal who’s won what.

This year, we can expect a host of big-name presenters, with the likes of Antonio Banderas, John Cho, Andrew Garfield, Salma Hayek Pinault, Sigourney Weaver, Nicole Kidman, Elizabeth Banks, Halle Bailey, Danai Gurira, Jessica Chastain, Florence Pugh and Hugh Grant each recently confirmed to open envelopes.

These names join a previously confirmed presenter list that spans Samuel L. Jackson, Janelle Monáe, Jonathan Majors, Emily Blunt, Glenn Close, Riz Ahmed, Jennifer Connelly, Dwayne Johnson, Michael B. Jordan, Ariana DeBose, Troy Kotsur, Melissa McCarthy, Donnie Yen, Deepika Padukone, Questlove and Zoe Saldaña.

It’s currently unclear who’ll be presenting what, so we’ll have to tune in to find out which category each Oscars 2023 presenter is ultimately assigned to.

Will Chris Rock and Will Smith be at the Oscars?

It’s not clear if Chris Rock will be back at the Oscars this year. He was presenting an award in 2022 when the infamous slap happened.

Will Smith will not be back at the Dolby Theatre either, as he had to resign from his membership of the Academy over the fight last year.

Smith has been banned from attending all Academy functions, including the Oscars, for ten years as a result of slapping Rock.