Meryl Streep is one of the best actresses, period. She’s done just about everything, is versatile with her acting, and can transform into just about any character imaginable. She’s deep with her craft; she’s had several decades of experience to perfect it, but really, she was essentially a natural from her very first acting role.
The Oscars are one of the biggest award shows when it comes to recognizing artists for their craft, and it shouldn’t be surprising that Streep has received more than 20 nominations for her work. It’s an incredible feat and a record other actors and actresses should hold themselves to because Streep is such a legend. Let’s take a look at her twenty-one nominations for an Academy Award, as well as the ones she took home.
21 Into the Woods (2014)
Taking the last spot on this list is her involvement in Into the Woods. Don’t get us wrong; Meryl Streep in a musical should’ve been great, as we’ve seen in Mama Mia! but her other nominated roles outshone her portrayal of The Witch in this Cinderella retelling. The film grossed over $200 million at the box office and was indeed praised for the acting, especially Streep’s, but certainly wasn’t the best Cinderella live-action experience.
Streep was compelling as The Witch, and her vocals were on point, as they usually are, but in the end, she lost to Patricia Arquette for Boyhood.
20 One True Thing (1998)
One True Thing is mostly a mundane movie about a daughter coming home to take care of her dying mother and learning more about her parents than she had in her young life. Streep plays Kate, a housewife who diligently works hard for her husband and kids, and Renée Zellweger plays the daughter, Ellen, who idolizes her father and thinks of her mother as quite ridiculous.
You’ll feel your heartstrings start to pull as you watch Ellen start to learn more about her mother and the hardships she faced with being a housewife, as well as the devastation that Ellen goes through once she learns the real reason Kate died. Meryl Streep sadly didn’t take home the Best Actress award, but instead, it went to Gwyneth Paltrow for Shakespeare in Love.
19 Music of the Heart (1999)
Music of the Heart is a very sweet film if you like movies that focus on teachers who really care about their students and form everlasting bonds with them. The film was directed by Wes Craven, who’s mostly known for his work in the horror genre, such as the Scream franchise, but Music of the Heart is the only film that gained him nominations at the Oscars, which is neat.
Streep plays a violinist named Roberta who lives in New York City and is desperate to get her life back after a divorce, so she starts to teach violin at a school. If you have a connection to music or are a teacher who cares about your students, definitely give Music of the Heart a try.
18 Adaptation (2002)
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Adaptation is very meta, funny, and just slightly confusing for you to be intrigued the entire time until the credits roll. The plot follows a man named Charlie Kaufman, who’s a screenwriter and takes it upon himself to rewrite Susan Orlean’s The Orchid Thief. Nicolas Cage plays both Charlie and his twin brother Donald, and the sight of two Cages is definitely amusing as you watch them interact with each other.
Streep plays Orlean and is truly captivating as you watch her become a bit manic and order a death sentence on Charlie. Susan Orlean wasn’t Streep’s strongest role but was still memorable, with Catherine Zeta-Jones taking home the Best Supporting Actress award for Chicago instead.
17 The French Lieutenants Woman (1981)
The French Lieutenant’s Woman was Meryl Streep’s first Supporting Actress nomination, and we can see why with the dual plot and the two different characters she took on in this film. The movie was based on the 1969 novel of the same name by John Fowles and focuses on two different love stories that are essentially affairs. In the adaptation, Streep plays a woman named Sarah who has an affair with a married man named Charles.
The two spend a night together before Sarah disappears, leaving Charles distressed. In real life, Streep plays a woman named Anna, who’s portraying Sarah, and once again has an affair with the man who is playing Charles. It’s a great period piece that showcases more of Streep’s acting skills so early in her career.
16 Florence Foster Jenkins (2016)
Florence Foster Jenkins is one of Streep's most recent nominations, and the film itself received high praise, especially in the costume department. Florence is a very rich woman living in New York City in 1944. She prides herself on being a socialite and surrounds herself with people who genuinely just want to make her happy. It turns out that she loves to sing, but sadly, she’s terrible at it.
She becomes a bit obsessed with the thought of performing for large audiences. The movie is lighthearted and sweet, and you might just have to sit through the terrible singing to appreciate what Streep did with Florence Foster Jenkins and how her story comes to an end.
15 Postcards from the Edge (1990)
If you’re a fan of the late and beloved Carrie Fisher, you should check out Postcards from the Edge, which is based on Fisher’s autobiography of her life. Streep portrays Fisher, essentially, as an actress who’s a recovering drug addict, has been to rehab more than once, and has overdosed on cocaine and Percodan. It’s labeled as a comedy-drama film, but it’s quite sad as you see Suzanne (Streep) struggle with addiction and fight to get clean.
She struggles with the relationship with her mother since she’s adamant about Suzanne going to rehab, but the two have a special moment in the hospital as they talk through their differences and Suzanne brushes off a doctor who wants to take her out on a date.
14 Out of Africa (1985)
Sometimes a marriage of convenience plot line isn't as romantic as it seems. Especially when your husband ends up giving you syphilis because he can’t be faithful, even though it seems like he was falling for you in the end. Out of Africa is not so much a romance as it is a coming-of-age story for adults. Karen Blixen, a wealthy unmarried woman, proposes to her brother’s friend to marry her out of convenience.
They end up moving to Africa, where he buys a coffee farm, and she learns to love the people of Africa and ends up becoming very loved there in return. Streep was great in this film, but ultimately lost the award to Geraldine Page for The Trip to Bountiful.
13 Ironweed (1987)
If you’re from Upstate New York, and more specifically, the Albany area, you’ll be pleased to know the impact Ironweed had in this area. Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep teamed up for this drama that follows a drunk who is haunted by the things he did in the past, such as accidentally killing his young baby by dropping him. Streep plays his good friend and lover, who also struggles with alcoholism; the two are genuinely a mess as they wander through the streets of Albany on Halloween night.
What starts off as a casual night out on the town turns intense when a group of people start to form a plan to get rid of the homeless people that live in Albany, creating much tension and stress for our main characters.
12 Doubt (2008)
Doubt is a highly intense film that’ll leave you on the edge of your seat as you watch something that’s been a problem for years and has been exposed more and more as the years go on. Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman are an unlikely duo that's a force to be reckoned with as they go head-to-head. Hoffman plays a priest who turns to abusing his altar boys, and Streep plays Sister Aloysius Beauvier, the principal of the school in which this is taking place.
Streep’s character becomes dedicated to exposing Father Flynn (Hoffman) for his actions, and she’s completely captivating throughout the film.
11 The Deer Hunter (1979)
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Streep’s character in The Deer Hunter doesn't get the spotlight, but since it’s her first nomination at the Oscars, it’s definitely a big deal. The Deer Hunter was directed by Michael Cimino, and he informed Streep that she should improvise most of her lines, which is neat, and if you re-watch it or watch it for the first time, you might be able to tell that Streep wrote them herself.
Streep plays Linda, a woman who’s running away from her abusive father and marries a man on a whim before she eventually finds love somewhere else. What was to be her first Oscar went to Dame Maggie Smith for California Suite.
10 The Bridges of Madison County (1995)
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Something you might notice in this list is how many characters Meryl Streep has played that are married and seem to have ongoing affairs with different men. Streep is excellent at playing these women who aren’t satisfied with their home life and husband and decide to take care of themselves and find someone who they’re actually in love with, but in return, it usually doesn’t end that well.
In The Bridges of Madison County, Streep plays Francesca Johnson, a housewife who meets a photographer named Robert Kincaid, and in just four days, the two fall madly in love with each other. Years later, when Francesca dies, her adult children discover their mother’s affair and the man that she could have possibly left her family for. It’s dramatic and sweet, and it could possibly leave you thinking about the one that got away.
9 The Post (2017)
The Post is Meryl Streep’s most recent nomination for an Academy Award and is somewhat based on actual events. It features a great ensemble cast with the likes of Tom Hanks, Bob Odenkirk, Sarah Paulson, and more. The film is set in 1971, and Streep plays a woman named Katherine Graham, who was the publisher of the Washington Post at that time and took the job after her husband, the former publisher, died.
She didn’t have much experience in the publishing world, but soon came into possession of precious documents regarding Watergate and the Pentagon Papers. Streep and Hanks play wonderfully off each other in this film; they are both hard-headed and set in their ways, but they manage to work together and create something great. Streep sadly lost the Oscar to Frances McDormand for her electric performance in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri.
8 Evil Angels (1988)
Evil Angels depicts a true story in which a young baby is taken from a campground in Uluru, Australia, and the journey her parents take to prove that they were innocent of the death of their child. Meryl Streep plays Lindy Chamberlain, the mother of young Azaria, and the film is quite intense, especially if you have a young one at home.
When Azaria is seemingly taken by a dingo from their tent and tragically eaten, the people surrounding the Chamberlain family as well as the media start to suspect that they actually killed their child because the story is so unbelievable. Lindy is arrested for murder, appearing cold and Stoic to the jury, making it really seem like she was capable of such a thing. Streep really plays this character well, so much so that you might find yourself rooting against her.
7 Julie and Julia (2009)
If you’ve seen Julie and Julia more than once, you can probably hear Meryl Streep’s accent in your head—the high pitch and drawn-out vowels—something you can’t really forget. Streep portrays Julia Child in this film that you should avoid watching if you’re hungry, following two separate points of view with Child and Julie Powell (Amy Adams). In the 1950s, we follow Julia Child as she sets out to write a cookbook of her very own, going to Le Cordon Bleu to attend French cooking classes even though she was a woman.
In 2002, you come to love Julie Powell, a woman who wants more for her life, so she takes it upon herself to make all 524 of Julia Child’s recipes in just a year. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, and you’ll be starving by the time the credits roll.
6 The Iron Lady (2012)
Meryl Streep is one of the best leading ladies we have right now in film and have had for several years, so when she took on the role of The Iron Lady, aka Margaret Thatcher, no one was worried that she wasn’t going to do her justice. It was a box office smash as Streep portrayed the older Thatcher in the '90s, when she was really starting to age and become a bit out of control by the time she resigned from her Prime Minister position.
Streep can easily make the toughest person cry when watching one of her films, but there’s something different about her role as Thatcher—something more heartbreaking as she’s overcome with grief over her late husband as the movie ends.
5 Silkwood (1983)
Fresh from filming Sophie’s Choice, Streep was booked and busy as she immediately jumped into Silkwood, a turning point for not only her career but Kurt Russell's and Cher’s as well. Silkwood follows the true story of Karen Silkwood, who was a labor union activist and, essentially, a whistleblower for the wrongdoing that was taking place at the Kerr-McGee plutonium plant.
Streep gives a fantastic performance as she fights for what’s right, losing her boyfriend along the way but knowing in the end that what she was doing was more important. Tragically, she ends up dying at the end of the film and in real life as well, getting into a car crash that the public believes was premeditated. It’s easy to believe once you see what she was trying to deliver to a union meeting, making Karen Silkwood’s story important to tell.
4 Sophie's Choice (1982)
Sophie’s Choice sounds like a lighthearted movie at first glance, but in all actuality, it’s very sad and very intense. Streep plays Zofia "Sophie" Zawistowski, a Polish immigrant who has ties to the Nazi party from her father and ex-husband and now lives in Brooklyn. Things spiral quickly out of control as Sophie gets involved with Stingo and Nathan; her children are put in danger, and she has to make a devastating decision.
You’ll be feeling like you have whiplash from how fast this movie moves and the twists and turns it takes, such as when Sophie and Stingo share a night together before Sophie leaves and returns to Nathan, where they then take their own lives.
3 The Devil Wears Prada (2006)
The Devil Wears Prada is one of Streep's most well-known roles, and for good reason. If you’ve ever interned at a place that’s high-strung and idolizes the boss, then you might find a sense of familiarity with Streep’s character, Miranda Priestly. Priestly is a very powerful fashion magazine editor and, essentially, is hell on earth as she controls her office with an iron fist and almost everyone is afraid of her.
You might have to watch it a few times to understand that Priestly is actually not the villain in this movie, but instead, Andy’s boyfriend and so-called friends are the ones that you should hate. Meryl Streep absolutely dominated this role, portraying the perfect boss that you want to dislike but also want to be.
2 August: Osage County (2013)
If you have a dysfunctional family and chaos seems to ensue when you’re all gathered together for either a holiday or a funeral, you’ll be pleased to know that they made a movie about your life. August: Osage County depicts a family in crisis when the head of the family, the patriarch, goes missing, and everyone has to come together for the mess that is Violet Weston (Meryl Streep).
She has cancer and a drug addiction as well, and as more and more of her family pile into her home for the funeral, she becomes severely unglued, which in turn damages more of the familial relationships that she already had. Streep is so fantastic in this movie because she portrays someone with an addiction as well as a sickness so well and so believable that everyone's reaction to her in the film is completely on point and real.
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