Oscar winners - Best Actors - Luminary signs

[Jim Eshelman]

In the late '50s and early '60s, Donald Bradley wrote a couple of times about the heavy dominance of Pisces Suns among best actor winners 9both men and women). That Pisces dominance was especially distinctive to the style of motive making of the 1950s, and I imagine such preferences will vary over time.

I decided to repeat it for all winners to date. I have the names and birthdays of every winner from the 1928-29 composite season to the most recent awards (2015) - 177 winners in all (since two men won Best Actor one year). Here are the Sun and Moon signs, first split by sex and the combined.

[Jim Eshelman]

MEN (89)
Tau - 5
Gem - 7
Can - 7
Leo - 6
Vir - 5
Lib - 8
Sco - 5
Sag - 10
Cap - 7
Aqu - 4
Pis - 13
Ari - 12
(Pisces remains the top, but with Aries adjacent.)

WOMEN (88)
Tau - 4
Gem - 10
Can - 9
Leo - 5
Vir - 11
Lib - 8
Sco - 5
Sag - 9
Cap - 2
Aqu - 6
Pis - 8
Ari - 11
(Quite the surprise: Virgo and Aries have the most.)

COMBINED (177)
Tau - 9
Gem - 17
Can - 16
Leo - 11
Vir - 15
Lib - 16
Sco - 10
Sag - 19
Cap - 9
Aqu - 10
Pis - 21
Ari - 23
(Pile them all together, and you have, respectively, Aries, Pisces, and Sagittarius in the top three spots.)

[Jim Eshelman]

MEN (89)
Tau - 4
Gem - 8
Can - 13
Leo - 9
Vir - 9
Lib - 7
Sco - 2
Sag - 7
Cap - 5
Aqu - 9
Pis - 8
Ari - 8
(The two stand-outs are the big lead in Cancer - spot on! - and the near-absence of Scorpio.)

WOMEN (88)
Tau - 13
Gem - 4
Can - 7
Leo - 7
Vir - 4
Lib - 5
Sco - 5
Sag - 7
Cap - 12
Aqu - 8
Pis - 7
Ari - 8
9Women show a different pattern, with highest spikes in Taurus and Capricorn, and lows in Gemini and Virgo.

COMBINED (177)
Tau - 17
Gem - 12
Can - 20
Leo - 16
Vir - 13
Lib - 12
Sco - 8
Sag - 14
Cap - 17
Aqu - 17
Pis - 15
Ari - 16
(That spike in Cancer is exactly on target, even though not technically "significant.")

[Jim Eshelman]

Historically, woman and men have had different societal roles in general and in Hollywood. Sex sells. And good acting sells too. The two together can form a real awesome actress and actor. But woman historically need to look more pretty or attractive and men need to look tougher and masculine. Of course there are exceptions. Meryl Streep and Goldie Hawn looked hot in 'Death Becomes Her", but they never looked like Angelina or Megan Fox. Yet Meryl Streep is a really good actress. So she ultimately wins many major Awards. But now as time goes on, prettier actresses are also becoming good at the skill of acting since woman have more rights, freedoms and such.
Taurus and Capricorn moon woman are sexier than most, hence the higher numbers. Combining men and woman at this day in age doesn't show that Cancer moon is top in either men or woman. It shows that the combination of men and woman moon signs show Cancer as top.

[Jim Eshelman]

Exactly. It's the better overall measure.

BTW, i've long thought that movies that won a best actress Oscar were better movies than the ones that won best picture, director or actor (which often are the same film, with actress in a different film). The type of film is different - and what a woman has to do to win is quite different.

[Jim Eshelman]

But there is another thing very prominent and obvious in this data, and that is the fact that the Suns and Moons actually just spread into most of those signs. Three signs are highest in the combined data, but the other signs follow close behind.

That's what we usually see in such studies, even ones with starker results. There is a threshold of statistical significance, after which everything sort of flows together. (I haven't given exact z-scores or Chi-squares because I'm not sure what to normalize against - probably the relative frequency of Sun being in each sign, based on its variable speed, would be close enough.)

Another point is that I counted each person for each time they won - which seems to make sense on the grounds of, "If you win more often, you're probably more representative of the people who win." But this has consequences such as Hepburn (who won four times) and Daniel Day-Lewis (three times) bumping Aries Sun higher than anyone has reported it previously. I should probably redo it, allowing each person only once, and compare.

[Jim Eshelman]

Yes I agree, the counting needs to also reflect counting each winner only one time.
Not saying which is more right, but needs to be compared.

[Jim Eshelman]

As a generalization (and this should apply to the Moon signs if not the Sun), with 89 instances, the average per sign is 7.4 (or, for the 88 women, 7.3). On even-twelfths, the standard deviation is 2.61. 1.64 sigma (10%, 10-to-1 level) is reached more than 4.28 from mean expected, i.e., 12 or more (or, 3 or less). 1.96 sigma (20% or 20-to-1 level) is reached more than 5.11 from mean expected, i.e., 13 or more (or, 2 or less).

I'll mark the results above with this, but understand the solar figures need some adjustment for irregular distribution.

For all 177, the average per sign is 14.75. On even-twelfths, the standard deviation is 3.68. 1.64 sigma (10%, 10-to-1 level) is reached more than 6.03 from mean expected, i.e., 21 or more (or, 8 or less). 1.96 sigma (20% or 20-to-1 level) is reached more than 7.21 from mean expected, i.e., 22 or more (or, 7 or less).

[Jim Eshelman]

As I start to compile the second list, ruling out duplicate wins, I'm seeing just how many times Aries was involved in multiple wins for one actor. The least we can conclude is that the Aries Sun character (probably due to ambition and drive) pushes for professional attainment competitively.

Besides the only woman to have won four times (Hepburn) and the only man to have one three times (Lewis), we have other double-winners like Jack Nicholson and Gary Cooper. These really push those numbers up. Other multiple winners similarly show ambitious sign pairings (I just cleared the duplicate for Hilary Swank, a Cancer-Sagittarius, and Jane Fonda a Sagittarius-Cancer).

[Jim Eshelman]

NOT DONE YET

MEN (79)
Tau - 5
Gem - 6
Can - 6
Leo - 4
Vir - 5
Lib - 8
Sco - 5
Sag - 10
Cap - 7
Aqu - 4
Pis - 11
Ari - 8
(Pisces, trailed closely by Sagittarius, is the easy leader.)

WOMEN (73)
Tau - 4
Gem - 8
Can - 8
Leo - 4
Vir - 11
Lib - 6
Sco - 4
Sag - 7
Cap - 2
Aqu - 5
Pis - 7
Ari - 7
(An almost shocking showing for Virgo - nearly double the expected number - and the sparseness we saw before for Capricorn. PS, the of 11 Virgo women, just off the top of my head, we had a deaf girl's language teacher, an cross-dressing Shakespearian, a prim-yet-fun nanny, a nun... just from the movies familiar to me.)

COMBINED (152)
Tau - 9
Gem - 14
Can - 14
Leo - 8
Vir - 16
Lib - 14
Sco - 9
Sag - 17
Cap - 9
Aqu - 9
Pis - 18
Ari - 15
(Spokes really own it, with Pisces the winner, trailed barely by Sagittarius. Of 152 a actors, 65 have Spoke Suns - that's 43% instead of the expected 25%.)

[Jim Eshelman]

MEN(79)
Tau - 4
Gem - 6
Can - 12
Leo - 8
Vir - 7
Lib - 7
Sco - 2
Sag - 6
Cap - 5
Aqu - 9
Pis - 7
Ari - 6
(The peak in Cancer, at almost twice average expectancy, and the deep trough in Scorpio persist.)

WOMEN (73)
Tau - 9
Gem - 3
Can - 6
Leo - 6
Vir - 4
Lib - 4
Sco - 5
Sag - 6
Cap - 10
Aqu - 8
Pis - 6
Ari - 6
(Capricorn is the easy leader for Moon-sign - just as much as it is missing for Sun.)

COMBINED (152)
Tau - 13
Gem - 9
Can - 18
Leo - 14
Vir - 11
Lib - 11
Sco - 7
Sag - 12
Cap - 15
Aqu - 17
Pis - 13
Ari - 12
(Cancer is, again, the standout. With the average being 12-13, only three signs wander even 2 occurences away from the mean. Aquarius is an interesting surprise as a close second.)

[Jim Eshelman]

Yes the Moon is a tricky one.

COMBINED (152)
Tau - 9
Gem - 14
Can - 14
Leo - 8
Vir - 16
Lib - 14
Sco - 9
Sag - 17
Cap - 9
Aqu - 9
Pis - 18
Ari - 15
(Spokes really own it, with Pisces the winner, trailed barely by Sagittarius. Of 152 a actors, 65 have Spoke Suns - that's 43% instead of the expected 25%.)

Actually I would put this differently.
Jupiterian signs + exalted Jupiter sign are highest along with exalted Sun sign and the Mercury signs.