Amanda Seyfried Wasn't Shocked That She Didn't Get an Oscar Nomination for 'The Testament of Ann Lee'

We had a great Oscars run for 2025/6, all things considered. Still, there were a couple of films not nominated at all whose absence stung. The Testament of Ann Lee was one of them, but nobody was all that shocked that the Academy seemed uninterested in a historical drama musical about a woman leading a religious sect through dance. It’s a shame because it’s also the finest hour of Amanda Seyfried, an actress who has always been great even when the material is lacking.

Seyfried is delightfully candid about her career and the machinations of trying to balance business with art. She talked about how the nomination matters more than the win with the Oscars because it’s such an effective career boost. She also admitted that her executive producer credit for The Housemaid was pure vanity and she didn’t do sh*t to earn it. I love her. So, when she was asked in a junket interview about whether or not she was shocked by the lack of Oscars love for The Testament of Ann Lee, she was suitably open and on the money about the whole thing.

“It’s a good stepping stone for movies that normally wouldn’t be seen. And I love the business behind it. It’s really great. But the Academy didn’t really, not a lot of them saw our movie. They wouldn’t vote for it. And also, the nominations do come with a lot of campaigning, like any industry. It is political and that’s okay. I mean, I’m still here talking about it.”

She’s right, of course. The movie was absent from every tech category longlist, meaning that most people probably didn’t even check it out, which sucks but is also not a surprise. And it was a stacked year, full of deeply un-Oscar-y movies that you wouldn’t expect to flourish, so it’s not like Ann Lee was snubbed in favour of baity dreck. Seyfried did her share of campaigning and got some attention from the Golden Globes and critics’ circles, but Best Actress was a tough fight. It’s not like she did this very uncommercial movie just to win an Oscar anyway. It was a passion project that we’re thankful got made in a time of fewer big risks from producers and studios, and I’m always happy for Seyfried to get a meaty role deserving of her abilities.