Mar 16, 2026 6:37am IST
Oscars 2026: Sean Penn Bags His Third Academy Award For His Performance In ‘One Battle After Another’, Skips The Awards Ceremony
Sean Penn has won the Best Supporting Actor award at Oscars 2026 for his villainous performance in “One Battle After Another.” The movie directed by Paul Thomas Anderson saw him as Col. Steven J. Lockjaw. This is his third win at the Oscars. He won the Best Actor for “Mystic River” in 2004 and “Milk” in 2009. In Anderson’s “One Battle After Another,” Penn’s character was that of a military zealot who oversees a detention centre. A group of left-wing revolutionaries target his base and he gets embroiled with Willa (Chase Infiniti) years later. The movie starred Teyana Taylor and Leonardo DiCaprio as the parents of Willa.
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Sean was not present to take his award. Kieran Culkin took the trophy on his behalf and said, "Sean Penn couldn't be here this evening or didn't want to, so I'll be accepting the award on his behalf.” He has won quite a few awards for 'One Battle After Another' this season.
After this win, Sean Penn has tied with an elite list of actors like Meryl Streep, Jack Nicholson, Ingrid Bergman, Daniel Day-Lewis, Francis McDormand and Walter Brennan who have won three Oscar awards. The highest number of awards were won by Katharine Hepburn who won four of them.
Sean Penn began working from an early age as his father was also in showbiz. His first big movie was “Bad Boys” in 1983. Besides his acting chops, he is also known as an activist for human rights. "One Battle After Another" got 13 nominations at the Oscars. It has won six awards, the maximum for the night.
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