Act 5 of our Oscar round-up: Their Next Big Things

Oscar night is officially over. That means it’s T minus 97 days until Hollywood’s next watershed day: the SAG strike. Here’s how this year’s acting and directing nominees will fill their final days until unemployment.

BEST ACTOR

Russell Crowe is now shooting the Ron Howard drama A Beautiful Mind, in which he plays John Forbes Nash, a schizophrenic mathematician who won the Nobel Prize in Economics. His costar is one of his competitors, Ed Harris, who’ll appear as an intelligence officer seeking military applications for Nash’s work. The extremely busy Harris, currently on view in Enemy at the Gates, has also wrapped the thriller Prime Gig with Vince Vaughn; the drama Buffalo Soldiers, costarring supporting-actor nominee Joaquin Phoenix; and Best Director contender Stephen Daldry’s adaptation of Michael Cunningham’s 1998 novel The Hours, in which he plays a writer dying of AIDS. Tom Hanks is also currently working with an Oscar-caliber director, playing a gangster in Sam Mendes’ American Beauty follow-up, The Road to Perdition, while Band of Brothers, the WWII miniseries he exec-produced for HBO, will premiere in September. Geoffrey Rush, who can now be seen opposite Pierce Brosnan in The Tailor of Panama, will play an obsessive-compulsive in The Banger Sisters; he’ll also appear as Leon Trotsky in Julie Taymor’s upcoming Frida Kahlo biopic, and may next costar in what is shaping up to be the Oscar-bait film of the moment, an adaptation of the Katie Campbell novel The Assumption of the Virgin, possibly to feature Benicio Del Toro and Juliette Binoche. And Javier Bardem has completed a role in the John Malkovich-directed indie drama The Dancer Upstairs.

BEST ACTRESS

Capitalizing on her great buzz, Julia Roberts has a full schedule. She just filmed America’s Sweethearts, in which she plays the assistant to movie star Catherine Zeta-Jones. She also just reunited with Erin Brockovich director Steven Soderbergh, beginning a short stint in the Rat Pack remake Ocean’s Eleven. Laura Linney has reteamed with her Primal Fear costar Richard Gere for the thriller The Mothman Prophecies. Ellen Burstyn will star in the adaptation of Rebecca Wells’ 1997 novel Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. Joan Allen has filmed TNT’s July miniseries The Mists of Avalon, in which she plays an evil relative of Julianna Margulies and Anjelica Huston. She will also produce and star in Pushers Needed with Maggie Smith. And as noted above, Juliette Binoche, who has already filmed the French drama Code Unknown, may star in the adaptation of The Assumption of the Virgin.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Willem Dafoe has already wrapped three indies: Morality Play, in which he appears as the leader of an acting troupe that discovers a murder; the WWII drama Edges of the Lord, costarring one of last year’s nominees, Haley Joel Osment; and the Pearl S. Buck adaptation Pavilion of Women, in which he plays a missionary. He’s now suiting up as the Green Goblin for May 2002’s Spider-Man; and in June he’ll costar with fellow nominee Frances McDormand in an Off Broadway production of Phedre. Jeff Bridges recently wrapped a role opposite Kevin Spacey in the drama K-Pax and has also completed the thriller Scenes of the Crime. Traffic cop Benicio Del Toro is currently crossing the crime line to play an assassin in the thriller The Hunted, with Tommy Lee Jones and Connie Nielsen, and may appear in The Assumption of the Virgin. Joaquin Phoenix, who has wrapped Buffalo Soldiers opposite Ed Harris, will next star opposite Claire Danes in the drama It’s All About Love. And Albert Finney, who appears in two of this year’s Best Picture nominees (Erin Brockovich and Traffic), has yet to decide on his follow-up project.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

After playing an Irishwoman in the romance About Adam, due in May, Kate Hudson will appear in Elizabeth director Shekhar Kapur’s Four Feathers. Meanwhile, Judi Dench will reportedly star in an adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest (with Rupert Everett) and as the late novelist Iris Murdoch in Elegy for Iris; she’ll also lend her voice as a cow to Disney’s animated Sweating Bullets. Frances McDormand, who has wrapped the Robert De Niro crime drama City by the Sea and The Barber Movie (with Billy Bob Thornton) for husband Joel Coen, will next be seen on the New York stage with Willem Dafoe in Phedre. Julie Walters will star opposite Olympia Dukakis in The Comfort Zone. And Marcia Gay Harden will soon begin shooting TNT’s King of Texas, based on King Lear, and will be seen in the indies Just Like Mona and Gaudi Afternoon.

BEST DIRECTOR

In addition to helming Ocean’s Eleven (with George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Julia Roberts, and Matt Damon), Steven Soderbergh is exec-producing the thriller Insomnia, with Al Pacino, Hilary Swank, and Robin Williams. Ridley Scott is currently in Africa shooting the Somalia-based war movie Black Hawk Down with Josh Hartnett and Ewan McGregor. Billy Elliot film rookie Stephen Daldry is following up his debut with The Hours, amassing a dream cast that includes Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman, Julianne Moore, Claire Danes, and Ed Harris. And Ang Lee, who is now in preproduction on a big-screen version of The Incredible Hulk, will produce, but not direct, a prequel to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; he also wants to direct a musical.