Why Is There No Oscar for Best Choreography?

If you’ve watched this year’s Oscar-nominated films — actually, if you’ve been in a movie theater at all recently — you’ve almost certainly seen the work of a choreographer.

Some of the most prominent dances have earned critical praise: Constanza Macras’s delightfully unhinged duet for “Poor Things.” Justin Peck’s ardent dream ballet for “Maestro.” Fatima Robinson’s showstopping love letters to Black social dance for “The Color Purple.” Jennifer White and Lisa Welham’s fizzily heroic numbers for “Barbie.”

Other choreographers contributed in quieter, though no less essential, ways. Nobody would call the “Killers of the Flower Moon” fire scene — in which workers stoke a hellish blaze as part of an insurance fraud scheme — a dance number. But the choreographer Michael Arnold shaped the actors’ demonic movements for maximum biblical effect.

Collectively, the films above earned 37 Oscar nominations. None of their choreographers will be honored, or likely even mentioned, at the Academy Awards ceremony on Sunday.

Why isn’t there an Oscar for best choreography? It’s a question people in the dance world have been asking for decades.

And there’s no satisfying answer.

Imaginative, world-expanding dance helped make Hollywood what it is, defining the movie musicals of its golden age. So many classic movies live and breathe through their dance numbers, marvels of choreographic wit and technical ingenuity. Today’s film choreographers also shape far more than steps, creating scenes that propel plot in ways that dialogue can’t. It makes sense that dance scenes frequently go viral: Good film choreography can capture, succinctly and with striking clarity, the essence of a character, relationship or problem.