What to know:
- Kieran Culkin’s wins at the Golden Globes, Critics’ Choice, and BAFTAs mirror past Oscar winners for Best Supporting Actor.
- Since its launch in October, the Kalshi’s Best Supporting Actors Oscar prediction market has grown to over $600,000 in trade volume.
- Despite nominations at major awards, competitors like Guy Pearce and Jeremy Strong have struggled to gain traction, with their forecasted chances never breaking out of the lower percentiles.
What do Sean Connery, Morgan Freeman, and Ke Huy Quan all have in common? They have all won the coveted Oscar for Best Supporting Actor.
On March 2, 2025, the newest winner of this category will be crowned at the 97th Academy Awards. This year’s nominees include Russian, English, and American actors.
On Kalshi, a top prediction market platform, bettors have been forecasting this category’s winner since Oct. 25. The four-month-old market has accumulated more than $600,000 in trades. With stakes are high, here’s what you need to know before betting on the Oscars.
2025 Best Supporting Actor Oscar forecast
Kieran Culkin
Kieran Culkin is nominated for his role in Jesse Eisenberg’s A Real Pain. Culkin stars as Benji Kaplan opposite co-star, writer, and director of the movie, Jesse Eisenberg. The two play mismatched cousins as they rediscover their Jewish roots in Poland.
Culkin is the frontrunner in the category and has been for the majority of the time since the prediction market’s launch four months ago. For a brief moment, his lowest forecasted chance was 20% but he has since skyrocketed to 86%.
The reason is simple – he’s won every single major Oscar precursor award. He’s won the BAFTA, Golden Globe, and Critics’ Choice Award for Best Supporting Actor.
Guy Pearce
Guy Pearce stars in The Brutalist as Harrison Lee Van Buren, a wealthy American industrialist. The film is a period drama about a Hungarian-Jewish architect who emigrated to the United States after surviving the Holocaust.
Pearce was nominated at the BAFTAs, Golden Globes, and Critics’Choice Awards, but did not win any of them. He’s received many nominations at this year’s awards circuit and has won a handful of times at smaller award shows.
Pearce had a forecasted chance of 7% and has remained in the five to twenty range for the past four months. Unfortunately, his chances do not look good when up against Culkin.
Jeremy Strong
In the controversial film, The Apprentice, Jeremy Strong plays real-life lawyer Roy Cohn. The film follows Donald Trump’s career in the 70s and 80s, and his relationship with Cohn.
The film dealt with lots of backlash including Trump trying to block the movie from being released and having difficulties finding an American distributor.
Strong did not receive a nomination at the Critics’ Choice Awards, but he did receive nods from the BAFTAs and Golden Globes. Overall, he has only been nominated for the role a handful of times including big and small award shows.
Currently resting at 5%, Strong’s forecasted chance on the Kalshi prediction market never rose higher than 19%. His lack of many nominations and wins makes him also unlikely to win the category.
Edward Norton
The Bob Dylan biopic, A Complete Unkown, features many famous icons recreated on the screen. For example, Edward Norton played American folk singer Peter Seeger.
The film is based on the 2015 Elijah Wald book, Dylan Goes Electric! It chronicles Dylan’s journey to his controversial use of electric instruments.
Norton did receive nominations at the three major precursor awards and has won a couple of small awards at lesser-known ceremonies. His chances have consistently sat around two to nine percent for the last couple of months.
Yura Borisov
Yuri Borisov plays Igor, a henchman hired to look after a Russian oligarch’s son in Anora. The film follows an exotic dancer named Anora (“Ani”) who falls in love with the oligarch’s son.
With his Oscar nomination, Borisov became the first Russian actor to be nominated in an acting category in 47 years.
The BAFTAs, Golden Globes, and Critics’ Choice Awards did give Borisov a nomination, and similar to Norton, he’s won at a couple of the non-major award shows. Borisov is at the bottom of the market, never rising above 8% and currently at 1%.
Past Best Supporting Actor Oscar winners
The odds are in Culkin’s favor based on his recent wins, but let’s see if we can find similar trends for past Oscar winners.
Year | Oscar Winner | Golden Globe Winner | Critics’ Choice Winner | BAFTA Winner |
2010 | Christian Bale | Christian Bale | Christian Bale | Geoffrey Rush |
2011 | Christopher Plummer | Christopher Plummer | Christopher Plummer | Christopher Plummer |
2012 | Christoph Waltz | Christoph Waltz | Philip Seymour Hoffman | Christoph Waltz |
2013 | Jared Leto | Jared Leto | Jared Leto | Barkhad Abdi |
2014 | J. K. Simmons | J. K. Simmons | J. K. Simmons | J. K. Simmons |
2015 | Mark Rylance | Sylvester Stallone | Sylvester Stallone | Mark Rylance |
2016 | Mahershala Ali | Aaron Taylor-Johnson | Mahershala Ali | Dev Patel |
2017 | Sam Rockwell | Sam Rockwell | Sam Rockwell | Sam Rockwell |
2018 | Mahershala Ali | Mahershala Ali | Mahershala Ali | Mahershala Ali |
2019 | Brad Pitt | Brad Pitt | Brad Pitt | Brad Pitt |
2020 | Daniel Kaluuya | Daniel Kaluuya | Daniel Kaluuya | Daniel Kaluuya |
2021 | Troy Kotsur | Kodi Smit-McPhee | Troy Kotsur | Troy Kotsur |
2022 | Ke Huy Quan | Ke Huy Quan | Ke Huy Quan | Barry Keoghan |
2023 | Robert Downey Jr. | Robert Downey Jr. | Robert Downey Jr. | Robert Downey Jr. |
2024 | TBD | Kieran Culkin | Kieran Culkin | Kieran Culkin |
If you look at the previous winners of the Golden Globes, Critics’ Choice Awards, and BAFTAs since 2010, it’s a very good sign for Culkin. Every single time these three precursor awards agreed on a winner, the Oscars chose the same winner.
His dominance at the major precursor awards makes him the most statistically likely winner, and the Kalshi prediction market reflects that confidence, with his odds above 80%. While surprises can always happen on Hollywood’s biggest night, history suggests the odds are in Culkin’s favor.
