NEW YORK — While the Oscars may be Hollywood’s biggest night, New York and New Jersey are showing up in full force at this year’s Academy Awards.<\/p>\n
New York — it’s the city that never sleeps but is sure to be wide awake on Oscar night. When it comes to the 98th Academy Awards, the Tri-State area has a lot to brag about.<\/p>\n
Take “Marty Supreme,” for example.<\/p>\n
“It’s a real New York movie, paced like a New York movie, loud like a New York movie, with characters who look like they’re New Yorkers,” ABC News Contributor Chris Connelly said.<\/p>\n
Fandango Managing Editor Erik Davis agrees.<\/p>\n
“I think it represents a lot of what New Yorkers are. You know, we walk fast, we talk fast. It’s get out of my way. If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere. It tells you, like, this is what it’s like to be a New Yorker,” Davis said.<\/p>\n
Timothee Chalamet, a born and bred New Yorker who grew up in Hell’s Kitchen, went to LaGuardia High School and is now a Best Actor nominee.<\/p>\n
“Marty Supreme, which is very much about the New York hustle, and I think he’s a kid who kind of grew up and had to hustle his way into Hollywood, and so I believe it’s the perfect role. It’s a role he was born to play,” said Davis about Chalamet.<\/p>\n
Also up for Best Actor: Ethan Hawke for his role in “Blue Moon.”<\/p>\n
Hawke was born in Texas, but raised in New Jersey and has called the city home for decades. So, it’s pretty fitting that his first Best Actor nomination is for a New York story, set inside one of the most iconic restaurants in the city: Sardi’s.<\/p>\n
Sardi’s — the legendary Theater District institution that Broadway royalty has gathered for decades and where Hawke’s Oscar-nominated performance in “Blue Moon” comes to life.<\/p>\n
“I think Ethan Hawke is giving one of the finest performances of his career, anybody’s career, playing Lorenz Hart in this movie,” Broadway World’s Richard Ridge said.<\/p>\n
“And I love that they recreated Sardi’s of the opening night of Oklahoma in 1943. Sardi’s is the toast of Broadway and a Broadway institution.”<\/p>\n
Hawke weighed in on his first Best Actor nomination for the film.<\/p>\n
“You don’t make a movie or go on stage or make you don’t make anything to just send it into the void unnoticed. I’ve made, I don’t know, 90 or something movies and this has never happened before,” Hawke said.<\/p>\n
“So it does, you know, I’d be lying to say if it didn’t feel really good, but mostly what feels amazing is the look on your face when you’re talking about the movie. That feels really good.”<\/p>\n
Then there’s Michael B. Jordan, who grew up in New Jersey and went to Newark Arts High School,<\/p>\n
“Newark made me who I was. Honestly, it’s, it’s tough and rough, but at the same time, there’s a lot of love, there’s a lot of community,” Jordan said.<\/p>\n
Jordan honed in on his craft during auditions in Manhattan.<\/p>\n
“And that kid from Newark, New Jersey standing here right now. Mom, thank you for driving me back and forth to New York when we didn’t have enough money to go through the Holland Tunnel, when we were looking for gas money, parking spaces. You know what I’m saying? When I went up there for my auditions, thank you,” said Jordan after winning the SAG award for Best Actor.<\/p>\n
Three front runners for Best Actor, all shaped by the Tri-State. Two stories, as New York as it gets, and one Oscar up for grabs.<\/p>\n
The only question left: Who will win?<\/p>\n