John KampfeHome, In the News, New Jersey Oscars

Princeton’s Damien Chazelle is looking for a repeat performance. If the director and screenwriter of the Academy Award-nominated film La La Land wins a Best Director Oscar next month during the 89th Academy Awards show, he’ll be the second New Jerseyan in a row to win in that category.

In fact, Chazelle could do one better than New Providence native Tom McCathy, who took the directing honors last year for Spotlight. Chazelle also is up for a Best Original Screenplay Oscar, a category for which McCarthy was nominated as well last year but did not win.

The 32-year-old Chazelle is no stranger to the Academy Awards. He was nominated for the Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay award in 2015 for Whiplash.

If the Golden Globes are an indicator of how it will go for Chazelle then he’s in good shape. He took both the directing and screenwriting awards during the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s version of the Academy Awards a few weeks ago.

La La Land is a love story chronicling the trials and tribulations of a struggling jazz pianist played by Ryan Gosling (nominated for a Best Actor Oscar) and an aspiring actress portrayed by Best Actress nominee Emma Stone. Chazelle drew upon his music roots developed at Princeton High School (Class of 2003) for the film’s underlying jazz theme. La La Land was nominated a record-tying 14 times, matching only Titanic and All About Eve.

Chazelle isn’t the only New Jersey representative among this year’s Oscar nominees.

Meryl Streep makes what is almost an annual appearance on the Academy Award nominee lists. She is up for a Best Actress Oscar for the title role in Florence Foster Jenkins. Streep has been nominated a record 20 times for an acting Oscar.

The greatest actress of her generation and arguably of all time was born in Summit and grew up in grew up in the Basking Ridge/Bernardsville area. Streep has already won on three occasions. She has taken home two Best Actress awards for Sophie’s Choice (1983) and The Iron Lady (2012), and another Oscar as Best Supporting Actress for Kramer vs. Kramer (1980).

A pair of Montclair residents were nominated in the Best Documentary (Short Subject) category. Producers Kahane Cooperman and Raphaela Neihausen got the nod for Joe’s Violin.

Bergen County also is represented among the nominees. Arianne Sutner, who grew up in Teaneck and graduated from Teaneck High School, is a hopeful for an Oscar for Best Animated Feature Film as a producer of Kubo and the Two Strings.

The 89th Academy Awards will be televised live on ABC on Sunday, February 26, beginning at 7 PM Eastern.