One Battle After Another wins PGA top prize, sharpening its Oscar edge

Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another claimed the Darryl F. Zanuck Award for outstanding producer of theatrical motion pictures at the 37th Producers Guild Awards, strengthening the film’s position as the leading contender for best picture at the Academy Awards on March 15. The PGA victory adds to a string of major prizes and follows Anderson’s recent Directors Guild win, underscoring the movie’s dominant run through awards season.

Sources report the ceremony as the 37th Annual Producers Guild Awards; one photo caption places the event at the Fairmont Century Plaza in Los Angeles on February 28, 2026, while another account says the honor was presented at a ceremony in Beverly Hills. AwardsWatch notes PGA voting closed on February 3, the same crossover timing cited for the DGA balloting. The variety of timing and venue details in coverage has not been reconciled by the guild in the materials cited here.

Since 2009, when both the Producers Guild and the Academy expanded the best picture slates and adopted a preferential ballot, the PGA winner has gone on to win best picture at the Oscars all but three times, a statistical pattern that industry observers treat as a strong indicator. The Hollywood Reporter emphasized that the Darryl F. Zanuck Award has historically been the best predictor of the Oscar winner because PGA and Academy voting populations are similar and both use a weighted preferential ballot.

The PGA top prize was contested by a field that included Bugonia; F1; Frankenstein; Hamnet; Marty Supreme; One Battle After Another; Sentimental Value; Sinners; Train Dreams; and Weapons. AwardsWatch and Variety noted that One Battle After Another has already taken Critics Choice, the Golden Globes and BAFTA honors, creating a late-season near-sweep of major kudos.

Paul Thomas Anderson used his acceptance remarks to praise Warner Bros. Pictures executives, naming “De Luca and Abdy” as champions of the film. “Whatever the road lies ahead, your work this year is so spectacular. I share this with you. Long may you wave, whatever the future holds. It is one battle after another,” Anderson said. He added that the executives “deserve ‘to get an award for enduring a lot, a lot, on the road to get these films made,’” and credited them with protecting filmmakers and backing original material. “You kept your head down and you protected me. You protected Ryan. You protected Zach. That’s real producing. Letting us do our work and leading us here,” Anderson said.

The PGA result sets up a final public reckoning with Ryan Coogler’s Sinners at the SAG-AFTRA Actor Awards, where the ensemble prize could produce the only late swing against Anderson’s film. LATimes coverage noted Sinners “has one more chance to reverse the tide” at the Actor Awards on Sunday and reminded readers that the SAG ensemble honor, while prestigious, is not as strong a precursor to the Oscar as the PGA. AwardsWatch framed the matchup as a much-debated head-to-head with industry voters watching closely.

Beyond the theatrical race, the guild honored KPop Demon Hunters as outstanding animated theatrical motion picture and My Mom Jayne: A Film by Mariska Hargitay as outstanding documentary motion picture, a documentary choice that coverage noted was not among the Academy’s documentary nominees. Television winners included The Pitt for drama and The Studio for comedy. Sesame Street, Formula 1: Drive to Survive, Adolescence: The Making of Adolescence and The Wizard of Oz at Sphere picked up awards in children’s, sports, shortform and innovation categories, respectively. Lydia Dean Pilcher received the Vance Van Petten Entrepreneurial Spirit Producing Award and Jessica Li was named recipient of the Debra Hill Fellowship.

With Oscars on March 15 and Oscar ballots due near the end of this week, PGA voters’ choice has amplified One Battle After Another’s momentum as studios and campaigns prepare for the final votes.