‘Oppenheimer' Steamrolls Toward Oscars with SAG Award Wins

Cast members of Oppenheimer pose with the award Cast in a Motion Picture at the 30th Screen Actors Guild Awards, in Los Angeles, California, US, February 24, 2024. REUTERS/Mike Blake
Cast members of Oppenheimer pose with the award Cast in a Motion Picture at the 30th Screen Actors Guild Awards, in Los Angeles, California, US, February 24, 2024. REUTERS/Mike Blake
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‘Oppenheimer' Steamrolls Toward Oscars with SAG Award Wins

Cast members of Oppenheimer pose with the award Cast in a Motion Picture at the 30th Screen Actors Guild Awards, in Los Angeles, California, US, February 24, 2024. REUTERS/Mike Blake
Cast members of Oppenheimer pose with the award Cast in a Motion Picture at the 30th Screen Actors Guild Awards, in Los Angeles, California, US, February 24, 2024. REUTERS/Mike Blake

Historical epic "Oppenheimer" picked up more prizes on Saturday at Hollywood's Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards, bolstering the movie's chances to score the best picture trophy at next month's Oscars. The film about the race to build the first atomic bomb took the top honor - best movie cast - handed out by members of the SAG-AFTRA actors union at a red-carpet ceremony in Los Angeles.

Cillian Murphy, who played scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer, won best movie actor, and co-star Robert Downey Jr. best supporting actor.
Irish actor Murphy said he took up the profession after trying to make a career as a musician and often felt like an "interloper."
"This is extremely special to me because it comes from you guys," Murphy told his fellow actors as he accepted his award.
SAG-AFTRA's choices are closely watched because actors form the largest group of voters for the Academy Awards, the film industry's top prizes.
At the moment "Oppenheimer" appears unstoppable. Director Christopher Nolan's drama already has claimed trophies at the Golden Globes, the British Academy Film Awards and other ceremonies. Honors from Producers Guild of America, another key predictor of Oscars success, will be announced on Sunday.



‘Secrets of the Penguins’ to Be Premiered on Eve of Earth Day

A group of adult Emperor penguins travel along the sea ice on their bellies after exiting the water against, as the ice shelf is seen in the distance, on the Ekström Ice Shelf, Antarctica, in this undated handout image obtained by Reuters on April 17, 2025. (National Geographic/Bertie Gregory/Handout via Reuters)
A group of adult Emperor penguins travel along the sea ice on their bellies after exiting the water against, as the ice shelf is seen in the distance, on the Ekström Ice Shelf, Antarctica, in this undated handout image obtained by Reuters on April 17, 2025. (National Geographic/Bertie Gregory/Handout via Reuters)
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‘Secrets of the Penguins’ to Be Premiered on Eve of Earth Day

A group of adult Emperor penguins travel along the sea ice on their bellies after exiting the water against, as the ice shelf is seen in the distance, on the Ekström Ice Shelf, Antarctica, in this undated handout image obtained by Reuters on April 17, 2025. (National Geographic/Bertie Gregory/Handout via Reuters)
A group of adult Emperor penguins travel along the sea ice on their bellies after exiting the water against, as the ice shelf is seen in the distance, on the Ekström Ice Shelf, Antarctica, in this undated handout image obtained by Reuters on April 17, 2025. (National Geographic/Bertie Gregory/Handout via Reuters)

Years of filming, often in extreme conditions, has provided new insights into the extraordinary challenges endured by penguins for a documentary series to be premiered on Monday, the eve of Earth Day.

"Secrets of the Penguins" is voiced by US actor Blake Lively and hosted by National Geographic explorer Bertie Gregory, who hopes to engage the widest possible audience with the natural world.

He says filming that included 274 days on the Ekström Ice Shelf in Antarctica, home to around 20,000 emperor penguins, as well as in locations from Cape Town in South Africa to the Galapagos Islands, led to discovering "new penguin secrets".

"I have filmed penguins a lot before," he said. "I thought I knew penguins. I was so wrong."

The three-part series, to be screened on Disney+ on Monday, and on Nat Geo Wild from Tuesday, in all took more than two years to film.

The highlights include penguin chicks jumping off a 50-foot (15 m) ice cliff in order to dive into the sea for the first time in their young lives.

"As soon as the first one went ... they all started to jump. It was an amazing moment to witness," Gregory said, adding the exploit has never been broadcast before.

"They're the only animal in the world to raise their young during the Antarctic winter. It is the coldest, darkest, windiest place on Earth," he said further.

Gregory says the significance goes beyond any one species.

"We should want to look after penguins, not just because it makes us feel warm and fuzzy inside, but because we need healthy, wild places for so many things," he said.

The 31-year-old explorer has two Daytime Emmy Awards for the series "Animals Up Close with Bertie Gregory" and a BAFTA Television Craft Award for shooting British naturalist David Attenborough's "Seven Worlds, One Planet".

He does not see himself taking on the mantle of the 98-year-old Attenborough, who is still at work.

"He's one of a kind," Gregory said. "There is no replacement."