Eddie Redmayne’s Stephen Hawking Biopic Going For Oscar Gold [Video]

Stephen Hawking’s magnificent story is coming to a theater near you, and if the debut trailer is any indication of its value, lead star Eddie Redmayne will be suiting up a lot for Oscar season. In The Theory of Everything, Redmayne plays the physicist, cosmologist, and author.

The trailer seems to focus on both Hawking’s physical ailments and his relationship with Jane Wilde, an art student who he fell in love with while at Cambridge University. The Theory of Everything seems to evenly portray Stephen Hawking’s genius, his struggle and ultimate perseverance of being diagnosed with a fatal illness at the young age of 21 years old.

The official synopsis is as follows:

“Little was expected from Stephen Hawking, a bright but shiftless student of cosmology, given just two years to live following the diagnosis of a fatal illness at 21 years of age. He became galvanized, however, by the love of fellow Cambridge student, Jane Wilde, and he went on to be called the successor to Einstein, as well as a husband and father to their three children.”

The plot continues:

“Over the course of their marriage as Stephen’s body collapsed and his academic renown soared, fault lines were exposed that tested the lineaments of their relationship and dramatically altered the course of both of their lives.”

So why is Redmayne’s Oscar nomination inevitable? While it’s still early in the season to be championing for one person to get the gold, from what we can see this film has all the key ingredients to at least score the actor a nomination. For starters, it’s a straight biopic that doesn’t make any strange turns to set itself apart stylistically. From the looks of the trailer, it’s a standard structure and doesn’t overextend itself to be showy. In the last few years, the Academy members have proved that this is something that gets their attention, whether it’s Milk, Lincoln, Capote, or Boys Don’t Cry. These members love their reality-based stories.

Watch Eddie Redmayne as young Stephen Hawking in the trailer for The Theory Of Everything: http://t.co/TDJxn4vGqM pic.twitter.com/Rt9YHEHI4w

— ShortList Magazine (@ShortList) August 6, 2014

Secondly, it tackles a large public figure (in this case Stephen Hawking) with an illness. This is another strong ingredient to consider when looking at the upcoming award season.

Also, Eddie Redmayne has been on the bubble for the last few years. He got some attention in the biopic My Week with Marilyn, and then broke out the year after that in the musical adaptation Les Misérables. Actors that are on this path have succeeded in getting nominations in the past.

Check out the trailer of The Theory of Everything, which hits theaters in November 2014.

[Images via The Film Stage’s Twitter & Working Title]