Kieran Culkin is this year’s Critics Choice Award winner for best supporting actor.
The star, 42, won the award at the Friday, Feb. 7 ceremony held at the Barker Hanger in Los Angeles for his performance in A Real Pain.
The actor — who also won a Golden Globe Award for the film Jan. 5 — did not attend the Critics Choice Awards, so presenter Lupita Nyong’o accepted the role on Culkin’s behalf and explained that he is currently rehearsing for his upcoming Broadway role in a revival of Glengarry Glen Ross.
Culkin was first nominated for and won a Critics Choice Award back in 2003 for Igby Goes Down. He has extended his level of success at the ceremony with 2022 and 2024 wins for his work in the drama series Succession.
A Real Pain follows Culkin and writer-director-star Jesse Eisenberg as cousins reconnecting on a tour through Poland to honor their family’s roots after their grandmother’s death. Culkin has also received nominations for his performance at the SAG Awards, Film Independent Spirit Awards and Academy Awards.
Also nominated in the supporting actor category by the Critics Choice Association were Yura Borisov for Anora, Clarence Maclin for Sing Sing, Edward Norton for A Complete Unknown, Guy Pearce for The Brutalist and Denzel Washington for Gladiator II.
Anora, from writer-director Sean Baker, follows its title character (Mikey Madison) from Brighton Beach, New York, strip clubs to a whirlwind romantic elopement with the son of a Russian oligarch (played by Mark Eydelshteyn).
Borisov, 32, a classically trained Moscow-born actor, plays henchman Igor, who grows unexpectedly close to Anora over the course of the film. Baker wrote the role for the first-time Critics Choice nominee after seeing him in 2021’s award-winning Cannes Film Festival entry Compartment No. 6.
Maclin, 58, has earned critical praise for his supporting performance in Sing Sing. The A24 drama starring Colman Domingo recreates a real-life theater production from Rehabilitation Through the Arts that took place at Sing Sing Correctional Facility. The formerly incarcerated Maclin plays a version of himself, as do several other alumni from the program.
The actor also collaborated on the film’s story with John “Divine G” Whitfield (played by Domingo onscreen) and screenwriter Clint Bentley and writer-director Greg Kwedar. “I used a lot of instances that I witnessed during the course of my incarceration,” Maclin told PEOPLE of his role. “I incorporated all those things into this character.”
Honored for his performance as legendary musician Pete Seeger in A Complete Unknown, Norton, 55, was previously recognized by the Critics Choice Awards as an individual nominee for 2014’s Birdman and as an ensemble winner for Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery and Birdman.
A Complete Unknown, from writer-director James Mangold, stars CCA nominee Timothée Chalamet as 1960s-era Bob Dylan. He, Norton and Monica Barbaro as Joan Baez sang and played instruments live onscreen as the folk legends.
Pearce, 57, plays wealthy industrialist Harrison Lee Van Buren in The Brutalist, from writer-director Brady Corbet. Starring Adrien Brody as László Tóth, a Hungarian-born Jewish architect who emigrates to the U.S., the film has earned Pearce some of the best reviews of his long career.
The Australian actor has collected plenty of awards recognition since his breakout role in 1994’s The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, but this marks his first Critics Choice nomination.
Gladiator II brought a juicy role for Washington, 69, as a cunning former slave named Macrinus climbing the ranks of the Roman empire. Ridley Scott’s follow-up to the Oscar-winning Gladiator centers on Lucius Verus Aurelius (Paul Mescal), whom Macrinus employs as a fighter in the Colosseum.
Washington, who hinted at retirement while promoting Gladiator II, is no stranger to the Critics Choice Awards, with six nominations and a win stretching back to 2002’s Antwone Fisher.
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See PEOPLE’s full coverage of the 30th annual Critics Choice Awards as they’re broadcasting live on E! from Barker Hangar in Santa Monica. The show will also be available to stream the following day on Peacock.
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