The 88th Academy Awards are taking place this weekend to mark the end of the month of love. Here’s a look at the superstitious Oscars Love Curse that has plagued some Best Actress winners over the decades.
The 88th Academy Awards taking place at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, California this Sunday. All eyes will be on the Best Actress nominees for more reasons than just their acting talent and red carpet looks.
Unless you’re three time Oscar winner Meryl Streep, the Best Actress Award winners have been plagued with the Oscar love curse, a superstition that the woman who wins the Academy Award for Best Actress will have her boyfriend or husband cheat on her or divorce her soon after. This has also been applied to the Best Supporting Actress but not to any of the male actor categories.
Michael Jenson and Heeyon Kim examine the negative consequences of upward mobility that comes with the Oscar Curse In their paper published in Organisation Science. The paper discusses a conundrum for actresses: on one hand being nominated or winning an Oscar can significantly boost their careers but on the other hand, could ruin their marriage or relationship.
Here are top 10 actresses who have suffered the Oscars Curse:
Elizabeth Taylor won her first Oscar in 1961 for Butterfield 8 and in 1967 for Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? She starred opposite husband Richard Burton, who she divorced for the second time in 1976.
Barbara Streisand won an Oscar in 1969 for Funny Girl and divorced husband Elliott Gould in 1971.
Halle Berry won an Oscar for Monster’s Ball in 2002 and separated with husband Eric Benet the following year with the divorce being finalised in 2005.
South African actress Charlize Theron won her Oscar for Monster in 2004 and then broke up with her long-time boyfriend of nine years, Stuart Townsend in 2009.
Hilary Swank won her first Oscar in 2000 for Boys Don’t Cry and then in 2005 for Million Dollar Baby. She divorced her husband Chad Lowe in 2007.
Reese Witherspoon won her Oscar in 2006 for Walk the Line and in the same year announced that she is separating from husband of seven years Ryan Phillippe.
Jennifer Hudson won her Oscar in 2007 for Best Supporting Actress in Dreamgirls and split from longtime boyfriend James Payton the same year.
Kate Winslet won an Oscar in 2009 for The Reader and divorced husband Sam Mendes the next year.
Sandra Bullock won her Oscar in 2010 for The Blind Side and after a scandal arose when several women claimed to have had affairs with husband Jesse James, Bullock filed for divorce the same year.
Jennifer Lawrence won her Oscar for 2013’s Silver Linings Playbook and split with her actor boyfriend Nicholas Hoult the following year.
