Daniel Kaluuya didn’t have any expectations of winning an Oscar when shooting Get Out.
The film was one of the biggest hits of 2017, with first-time director Jordan Peele telling a story of racial tensions through his horror flick.
There has been a lot of awards buzz surrounding Get Out, and it landed two nods at the Golden Globe nominations, including Best Actor in a musical or comedy for Daniel, but the 28-year-old actor admits that’s not what the cast and crew were thinking about when they filmed it.
“Everyone was a fan of Jordan and Jordan’s voice, but I don’t think anybody had any expectations as to what it would do,” the English star told GQ America. “I mean, we knew it would have an impact, because racial relations are still kind of taboo, or people don’t say their views on them as regularly. So you’re just kind of like: This is going to shake something up. But it was a 23-day shoot. We were just trying to survive and get it done.”
But awards chatter hasn’t gone unnoticed by Daniel, and the actor, who shot to fame alongside Nicholas Hoult and Dev Patel on British TV show Skins, admits he’s “heard stuff”.
“I don’t know what I can divulge, but I’ve heard stuff,” he teased. “Even the fact that it’s in that space…What’s amazing to me is that you can bring that up as a question. And then whatever happens happens.”
However, Daniel says he’s clueless about what a full-scale Oscars campaign entails. Fellow English actor Mark Rylance, who won an Academy Award for Bridge of Spies in 2016, shunned the campaign trail last year, saying it was embarrassing to have to sell yourself, and Daniel also doesn’t seem keen to focus all of his attention on a possible award.
“I don’t (know what will be required of me),” he said about campaigning. “I’m always in and out of America, so I’ll be in and out of America—I have no idea to what extent. I just don’t know. We’ll just take every day as it comes, and we’ll see what happens.”
