Tom Hanks recently told Gold Derby while promoting Toy Story 5 that he has no interest in creating a new Oscar category for voice actors. Instead, voice acting should be strongly considered as a major acting category.
“I think there are enough categories,” Hanks said of the Oscars. “The truth is, voice actors can win Best Actor. The judging is ‘Emotional performance.’ For example, we talked about Andy Serkis. Even though he doesn’t appear as Andy Serkis, he gives it all the material. There are people who come close to being nominated but don’t appear on camera. That can happen to pure vocal actors as well.”
“If they were impressed, that meant they were impressed by human performance. That’s all the requirements are,” Hanks added.
Hanks has won two Best Actor Oscars for “Philadelphia” in 1993 and “Forest Gump” in 1994. He was nominated for an Annie Award in 1995 for voicing Woody in Toy Story. So far, the Oscars have not nominated a voice-only performance in any of the four acting categories. Perhaps the biggest contender in recent years is Scarlett Johansson, who garnered Oscar buzz for her voice role in Spike Jonze’s Her. The film won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.
Additionally, motion-capture acting has yet to be recognized in the acting category at the Oscars, much to the displeasure of top talent like James Cameron and Andy Serkis. In a 2024 interview with The Independent, Zoe Saldaña, who used motion capture to star in the movie Avatar, criticized the Oscars for continuing to downplay such performances.
“Old habits die hard, and it’s really hard to push for change when you have old facilities,” Saldaña said on the subject. “I understand that and I don’t begrudge it, but when you give 120% of yourself to something, it’s very depressing. I mean, not winning is fine, not getting nominated is fine, but when you’re ignored and then you’re disrespected and then you’re completely ignored…”
That same year, Cameron told Variety that she was overdue for Oscar recognition for her role as Neytiri in the Avatar series, explaining, “I’ve worked with Academy Award-winning actors, and Zoe’s performance has never been better than that. But in my movie, she plays a ‘CG character,’ so I feel like that doesn’t count in a way. That doesn’t make any sense to me.”
Read Hanks’ full interview at Gold Derby in the post below. “Toy Story 5” will be released nationwide on June 19th.
