Boss Level

Two-time Academy Award nominee Naomi Watts has garnered several impressive accolades throughout her career. Her first Academy Award® nomination for Best Actress was for her performance in Alejandro Gonzalez Iñarritu’s 21 Grams starring with Sean Penn and Benicio Del Toro. Her performance also garnered Best Actress Awards nominations from the SAG Awards®, BAFTAs, Broadcast Film Critics and Golden Satellites as well as Best Actress honors from multiple critics’ associations. At the Venice International Film Festival, she received the Audience Award (Lion of the Public) for Best Actress. The film itself won the Special Distinction Award at the Independent Spirit Awards. She also earned an Academy Award® nomination for Best Actress for her role in Juan Antonio Bayona’s The Impossible, starring alongside Ewan McGregor. For this role, she also earned Best Actress nominations for a Golden Globe Award, a SAG Award®, a Critics Choice Award and she received the Desert Palm Achievement Actress Award at the Palm Springs International Film Festival. Watts also earned a SAG Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in St. Vincent with Bill Murray. She also starred in Iñarritu’s Birdman with Emma Stone and Michael Keaton. The film won the Academy Award for Best Motion Picture as well as several other categories.

Watts will next star in Showtime’s The Loudest Voice with Russell Crowe, Ophelia with Daisy Ridley, and Luce with Tim Roth and Octavia Spencer. In addition, she recently completed The Wolf Hour, which premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival, Once Upon a Time In Staten Island and Boss Level with Mel Gibson and Frank Grillo. Other recent projects include David Lynch’s Twin Peaks reboot, Colin Trevorrow’s The Book of Henry, Netflix’s Gypsy, and The Glass Castle with Brie Larson and Woody Harrelson.

Watts has had an impressive list of movies since her acclaimed turn in David Lynch’s controversial drama Mulholland Drive, for which she earned Best Actress Awards from a number of critics’ organizations, including the National Board of Review and National Society of Film Critics. In addition to starring in Peter Jackson’s remake of King Kong, her film credits include Clint Eastwood’s J. Edgar, Doug Liman’s Fair Game, Woody Allen’s You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, Rodrigo Garcia’s Mother and Child, for which she received an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress, Tom Twyker’s The International; We Don’t Live Here Anymore, The Assassination of Richard Nixon, David O. Russell’s I (Heart) Huckabee’s; Gore Verbinski’s The Ring and its sequel, The Ring 2, Merchant-Ivory’s Le Divorce, John Curran’s The Painted Veil, David Cronenberg’s drama/thriller Eastern Promises; and Michael Haneke’s thriller Funny Games.

Her other recent credits include 3 Generations, the boxing drama Chuck, which screened at the Venice and Tribeca Film Festivals, the psychological thriller Shut In, Demolition, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival, Gus Van Sant’s Sea Of Trees, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, Noah Baumbach’s While We’re Young, and two of the installments in the Divergent franchise. 

Born in England, Watts moved to Australia at the age of 14 and began studying acting. Her first major film role came in John Duigan’s Flirting. She produced and starred in the short film Ellie Parker, which screened in competition at the Sundance Film Festival. She also produced titles including The Wolf Hour, Gypsy, 3 Generations, The Last Impresario, Adore, The Painted Vail, Funny Games, and We Don’t Live Here Anymore.

Among her many awards and recognitions, Watts received the Montecito Award from the Santa Barbara Film Festival for her role in King Kong; was honored by the Palm Springs Film Festival for 21 Grams; and was named the Female Star of Tomorrow at ShoWest and received the Breakthrough Acting Award at the Hollywood Film Festival, both for her work in Mulholland Drive. She was also honored for her entire body of work at the Deauville Film Festival.