For the first time in a very long time, this year’s BAFTA Film Awards nominations are being announced after the Oscar nominations are unveiled. Indeed, there’s a full five days to wait after AMPAS lifts the lid on the 2026 lineup of nominees on Thursday to discover the decision of British Academy voters on Jan. 27.
For BAFTA CEO Jane Millichip — who admits even her colleagues are unsure when the last time this scenario occurred — it makes for a pleasant change. “It’s nice to have Oscar being a bellwether for BAFTA,” she says, while also noting that the Oscars final voting window is still very much open when the BAFTA Awards ceremony itself takes place on Feb. 22.
Thanks to the BAFTA Longlist — first introduced in 2021 as part of the major BAFTA Review overhaul — there’s some indication of where voters are leaning. But while awards season big hitters like “One Battle After Another,” “Sinners,” “Hamnet” and “Marty Supreme” may lead the pack after the first round of voting, Millichip points to what the overall lineup of 82 titles showcases, which includes not just a “stonking” array of British films alongside debut features that have come from former short film nominees, but also the expanding viewing habits of its members (this year has the highest number of longlisted films as a proportion to total entries).
In a wide-ranging interview, Millichip discusses how being on the longlist is “career enhancing” and something to celebrate even for those who don’t then make the nomination stage, why BAFTA will be keeping the director category intervention to ensure parity in longlisted male and female filmmakers, and landing Alan Cumming as Film Awards host for the first time.
Is she prepared for the amount of tartan likely to be on display? “You can never have enough of it,” she says.
I hear that you were recently in LA for the for the BAFTA Tea Party.
Yes, I’ve been each year that it’s been on since I joined BAFTA. But we obviously had to skip last year [due to the fires]. But it’s a great opportunity for us to take BAFTA to L.A. to celebrate the longlist there, rather than celebrating it here. And we had an amazing turnout of talent. Actually, it was kind of gobsmacking, to be honest. But I was also grateful for an invite to the Globes.
Oh great – how was that?
It was really lovely. It’s a quite intimate room. But when I go to other people’s award ceremonies, I come back with a really boring set of photographs of the venue — menus, tables centers, sometimes under the tables, chairs. I’m standing around pointing my camera at the least glamorous things on display so I can share footage with the team. So there’s a busman’s holiday element to it.
Any inspiration from the Globes we might then see at the BAFTAs?
I think we’re set for this year. But it’s always good for the mood board.
We just had the BAFTA Longlist. How are you feeling?
I absolutely love the longlist because it’s long, as it says on the tin, it’s rich and it’s diverse. And if I were involved in a film that was longlisted but not nominated, I would want to know. I think it’s career enhancing. It’s a congratulations. It’s a well done. And, you know, in a really competitive field, I think it’s really great that for those people and films that have spots in the longlist, if they don’t make it to nomination, it’s still something to celebrate.
It was in 2021 that we started publishing it and it also provides another role, which is to encourage our members and voting members to watch as many films as possible. And after the awards, if anybody says to me, “What should I watch?” I go, “Look at the longlist.”
It’s perhaps no surprise that “One Battle After Another” dominated the longlist. But nice to see some great British titles in the mix — and in the best film category.
Yeah, and the outstanding British list is really, really good. There’s some stonking films in there. And it’s actually interesting, because it’s a celebration of British talent and British films, but quite a few of those films have been funded by American studios. So it’s a celebration of both British and American talent and filmmaking.
I feel like, as it’s the longlist stage rather than the nominations, you can probably offer some opinions. Any particular fllms you’re really pleased to see in the mix?
I cannot offer my opinions! I can only talk about “Casablanca.” But I can say that the big four — “One Battle,” “Sinners,” “Hamnet” and “Marty Supreme” — have gotten a lot of mentions on the longlist, and deservedly so. I think what is interesting this year is there’s some really strong flavors and there are films like “One Battle,” “Sinners” and “House of Dynamite” that have tackled really big, chunky subjects — whether it’s the moral ambiguity of activism, corruption, Black identity or world collapse — in quite specific ways. So I’m really impressed with the take that a lot of filmmakers have taken in not just attacking it head on. And I think as a result, it’s a really rich, textured list of films. And then there’s another group of films, if you can group them, that are these really beautiful personal stories, like “Hamnet” and “I Swear.”
We also track the talent in some way associated with BAFTA. So it’s great to see Akinola Davis with his film “My Father’s Shadow.” He is a BAFTA Breakthrough and he previously had a BAFTA-nominated short. And the same is true of “Pillion” director Harry Lighton — he has previously had a BAFTA-nominated short. And then “The Ballad of Wallace Island” is based on a short that was BAFTA-nominated.
One film that isn’t going to be present is “KPop Demon Hunters,” which was ruled ineligible despite lobbying by Netflix.
It’s important for us to back that idea that films need to have been presented in a theater. It would have been lovely to have it entered, but it wasn’t.
Outside of the U.K. industry, I think there was a little confusion about the longlist. But five years on, do you feel like people are starting to understand what they are about and why they exist?
Absolutely. When I was in LA last week, whenever I went to events I doorstopped a few people who were on the longlist and they were really delighted. I wasn’t looking for gratitude — I’m hoping for was engagement and recognition. I bumped into Kate Hudson and she was thrilled. So I do get the sense that it’s being understood and it’s worthwhile. Because anyone mentioned on the longlist still doesn’t know if they’re going to make it to a nomination.
We have an unusual scenario this year where the Oscar nominations are announced before the BAFTA nominations, which I don’t think has happened for a very long time. The usual route is that awards pundits will use the BAFTA noms to make predictions about the Oscars. Is there any concern that this might make the BAFTA nominations less relevant?
Not at all. It’s nice to have Oscar being a bellwether for BAFTA. But the fact is, the BAFTA ceremony is on the 22nd of February, which is still in the voting window of the Oscars. The switch around with nominations is simply a consequence of dates. But I certainly don’t think it makes us less relevant. What happens on Feb. 22 is particularly relevant to everyone at the academy.
The longlists were part of the huge BAFTA Review in 2020 implemented in 2021. Five years on, are the changes having the desired effect that was hoped?
It was before I joined. But I’m the beneficiary of a lot of hard work and time that went into that review. We have to look at what are we in control of at BAFTA. We have our membership and our awards process, so you start there. Since then, great efforts have been made to ensure that our membership maps much more to the population of the UK. We’ve also set diversity targets for our membership, which we can continue to map against the population data. We’ve hit most of those targets, and we’ve given ourselves stretch targets in certain areas. So that is working, but we continue to keep working on it.
And then, we have the longlist and the the randomized viewing groups, which were really about encouraging our members to watch as many films as possible, as wide variety as possible, outside their preference to ensure that more films are considered.
What we’re not in control of is what is made. An area that still we continue to pay attention to are the number of women in some of the craft categories, particularly text, sound editing, cinematography and, of course, directing. And at the longlist stage, we still have the intervention around directors so we have parity in number of women directors and male directors. But the industry stats around women directors are still not brilliant. As far as we know, 30% of British films were directed by women. So it will be interesting to see how many women directors don’t just make the director nominations, but how many films made by women directors feature at all in the nominations. So we’ll be keeping a keen eye on that. There’s some brilliant work made by women. But is it being seen? Is it being promoted? Does it receive the marketing budget that films made by men do?
So that positive intervention in the directors category for the longlists, given where we are, is here to stay for the time being?
Absolutely, because we think it’s necessary. We’re not here to fix elections or tell people how to vote, but we are here to say, ‘Have you looked over here?’
This year, you’ve got Alan Cumming hosting the awards. I know he’s Scottish, but I would say, given ‘The Traitors,’ he’s probably the highest profile figure in the U.S. to ever host the BAFTAs. He’s huge right now!
Yeah, he is. And when I was in LA, I was noticing all the billboards. And he’s recently had a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He’s a joy to work with. He’s naturally very funny. But he’s accomplished, he’s professional and and he’s up for some fun. David Tennant, by the way, was only ever going to do two, so we knew we’d have to change film host this year.
It is a bit of Scottish monopoly right now…
Yeah, we’ve very Caledonian!
Was Cumming’s popularity in the U.S part of the decision?
Yeah, of course it’s a factor. Because we want someone who’s going to be great at the job, great on the day, and someone who the British audience, principally, are going to respond to. And we’re on the BBC again and on BBC and BAFTA socials. But of course international matters, and so having a host that also plays well in the States, which is a big market for us, it’s a double-whammy.
Are you prepared for the sheer amount of tartan that’s going to be on display?
I might be wearing it myself! But no, I’m always prepared for tartan. You can never have enough of it. But David upped the ante with his tartan and his knees. So I’m hoping for more knees.