July 11, 2008–Submissions for the 15th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards nominations open Monday, July 14, and continue until 5 p.m. (PST), Wednesday, Oct. 29, it was announced today by SAG Awards Committee Chair Yale Summers.

Lowell Sherman's “She Done Him Wrong” was nominated for one Oscar, Best Picture, but Mae West, its star and driving force, was not.

Melissa Leo's superlative performance in the wonderful indie “Frozen River,” as Ray, a single mother of two boys scrapping for existence, should put her on the map as an Oscar contender. Her work demonstrates what we have known for a long time, that she is a marvelous actress who's been typecast in secondary and supporting roles.

To play the “soiled dove,” a term of the era for women of the night, Clint Eastwood cast the brilliant Amy Ryan, Oscar-nominated last year for playing the irresponsible mother of the kidnapped girl in Ben Affleck's “Gone Baby Gone.”
Ryan says she was eager to visit another era of American history to play a wrongly accused character: “Carol says to Christine: 'If we're crazy, meaning women, nobody has to listen to us.' If a woman had an opinion or went against any voice of authority, she must have been crazy. Therefore, the attitude was 'lock them up!'”

July 8, 2008–Annette Bening, elected to represent the actors branch, was among 14 voted to the board of governors, and the sole first-timer, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced Monday.