The nominees for the 98th Academy Awards were announced Thursday, and among those recognized is Pixar’s Elio, which received a nomination for Best Animated Feature. The film is directed by CalArtians Madeline Sharafian (Film/Video BFA 15) and Adrian Molina (Film/Video BFA 07), along with Domee Shi.
The Oscar nomination caps a strong awards-season run for Elio. The film was previously nominated for Best Motion Picture – Animated at the 2026 Golden Globe Awards, earned 10 nominations at the Annie Awards—including Best Animated Feature—and also received a Critics Choice Award nomination for Best Animated Feature.
Elio was originally conceived by Molina as a story shaped by the solitude of his early years, drawing on his upbringing on a military base and the sense of community he later found at CalArts. Molina departed the project midway to begin work on Coco 2, after which Sharafian and Shi served as the film’s lead directors. Molina’s nearly two-decade career at Pixar includes work as a 2D animator on Ratatouille, story roles on Toy Story 3 and Monsters University, and co-writing and co-directing the Academy Award–winning Coco. Sharafian joined Pixar as a story artist before making her directorial debut with the 2020 short Burrow, and later contributed story work on Turning Red and Onward. Shi is best known for directing Bao, which won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short.
Elio is joined in the Best Animated Feature category by KPop Demon Hunters, directed by Maggie Kang and Chris Appelhans. The filmmaking team visited CalArts in fall 2025 as part of the Character Animation Program’s Friday Night Talk series, where they spoke with students about the film’s development and creative process.
The 98th Oscars will be held on Sunday, March 15, 2026, at the Dolby Theatre at Ovation Hollywood and will be televised live on ABC, streamed live on Hulu.
