Glenn Close is on the short list of greatest actors never to have won an Oscar. Now she’s finally about to collect her first statuette.
On Wednesday, the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences announced the recipients for the 2026 Governors Awards, with the eight-time nominee leading the list. Close, whose career spans five decades and includes nods for The World According to Garp, The Big Chill, The Natural, Fatal Attraction, Dangerous Liaisons, Albert Nobbs, The Wife, and Hillbilly Elegy, will receive an Honorary Oscar at the 17th ceremony, to be held Nov. 15 at the Dolby Ballroom in Hollywood. While it’s not technically a competitive award and won’t count towards her EGOT, it will be an Oscar statuette and fit nicely alongside her three Emmys, three Tonys, three Golden Globes, and two Actor Awards.
The honorary award celebrates “extraordinary distinction in lifetime achievement, exceptional contributions to the state of motion picture arts and sciences in any discipline, or for outstanding service to the Academy.”
Joining Close will be another long-overdue contender: Ridley Scott. The filmmaker, who will also receive an honorary Oscar, has tallied four nominations across his storied career: Best Director for Thelma & Louise, Gladiator, and Black Hawk Down, and Best Picture for The Martian.
The third honorary Oscar recipient will be pioneering artist Floyd Norman. Hired in 1956, he became Walt Disney Animation’s first Black animator with credits on such indelible features as Sleeping Beauty, Mary Poppins, The Jungle Book, Robin Hood, Mulan, Toy Story 2, and Monsters, Inc.
Christine Vachon and Pamela Koffler will receive the Academy’s highest honor for producers, Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award. The duo, who founded the New York-based independent production company Killer Films in 1995, earned a 2024 Best Picture nod for Past Lives, and have ushered such films as Hedwig and the Angry Inch, One Hour Photo, Camp, The Company, and Materialists. Their Killer Films productions also include Velvet Goldmine, Happiness, Boys Don’t Cry, Far From Heaven, I’m Not There, Still Alice, Carol, First Reformed, Vox Lux, The World to Come, Zola, and A Different Man.
“The Academy’s Board of Governors is thrilled to present this year’s Governors Awards to five remarkable individuals whose groundbreaking work has forever shaped the art of filmmaking,” Academy President Lynette Howell Taylor said in a statement.
“Throughout her extraordinary body of work, Glenn Close’s unparalleled emotional range has brought to life some of the most complex characters in cinema. Floyd Norman is the legendary animator who has broken barriers and inspired generations of artists over his remarkable career. Sir Ridley Scott is a true visionary whose decades-long legacy has left an immeasurable impact on global cinema and culture. Christine Vachon and Pamela Koffler play a central role in American independent cinema, championing bold, ambitious and distinctive storytelling.”
