Adam McKay has been set to receive the WGA West’s Paul Selvin Award this year for outstanding achievement in writing Vice, his subversive comedy looking at the rise of Dick Cheney. They award will be presented February 17 at the WGA Awards in Los Angeles.
The news comes as Annapurna Pictures’ Vice is up for eight Oscars this year, including nominations for McKay’s original screenplay, his directing and Best Picture.
The WGAW said the Selvin award is given for a script which “best embodies the spirit of the constitutional and civil rights and liberties that are indispensable to the survival of free writers everywhere.”
Last year, Josh Singer and Liz Hannah won the award for writing Steven Spielberg’s The Post. Previous recipients include Tony Kushner, Margaret Nagle, Dustin Lance Black, Eric Roth, Scott Alexander & Larry Karaszewski, Alex Gibney, Tate Taylor, John McNamara and Susannah Grant.
“Vice is that unique accomplishment of an exhaustively researched screenplay that wrestles with serious, complex questions of freedom and democracy, but never loses sight of the humanity (or lack thereof) of its characters,” WGAW president David A. Goodman said in a release Thursday. “It is an inspiring piece of work, and the Paul Selvin Committee and the WGAW Board of Directors are thrilled to give Adam McKay this award.”
Said McKay: “I am thrilled to receive this tremendous honor on behalf of our film, Vice. Paul Selvin dedicated his life to shining a light on how essential constitutional rights and a free speech are to democratic societies. I hope we lived up to his spirit by making a film that depicts how misinformation, unchecked power and the erosion of civil liberties can lead to devastating and deadly consequences.”
McKay also received a WGA Original Screenplay nomination for Vice. Other pics in the running are A24’s Eighth Grade, Universal’s Green Book, Paramount’s A Quiet Place and Neflix’s Roma.
McKay and Charles Randolph won the WGA Award and the Oscar in 2016 for their script The Big Short.
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