Will This Finally Be Leo's Oscar Win?

Leonardo Dicaprio — should we pity him because he hasn't won an Oscar? Because in his honor, so many reverent and irreverent memes have been made from his awards season misery? The long answer: we shouldn't; he's had a long, successful career and a fulfilling life as a philanthropist, and, besides, this might actually change things: On Wednesday, it was announced that Leonardo DiCaprio partnered with Netflix to make documentaries and docu-series under a multi-year deal.

Yes, he may not have won an Academy Award just yet, but it looks like career-wise, not snagging a coveted award hasn't discouraged him from being prolific as ever. (Also, he's taken on a project where he'll play literally 24 characters, so there's that.)

As Variety reported, Leo's company Appian Way is part of the deal, and the documentaries will be about conversation awareness. Leo is an outspoken advocate environmental awareness and action. He said of the deal:

There’s never been a more critical time for our planet or more of a need for gifted storytellers to help us all make sense of the issues we face. Through this partnership with Netflix, I hope to give documentary filmmakers doing urgent and important work the chance to have their films seen immediately by audiences all around the world.

Leo and Netflix previously saw great success with their 2014 documentary Virunga, which followed park rangers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo trying to protect Virunga National Park, the home to the world's last mountain gorillas. Leo executive-produced the film — and lo and behold, it earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary.

But, so sadly in the trend of Leo, it didn't win. Still, though: the man has an entire separate Wikipedia page about all the awards he's been nominated for and won, and that pesky Oscars category, I imagine, haunts him. He's been nominated for a total of four Academy Awards in his career: for What's Eating Gilbert Grape, The Aviator, Blood Diamond, and The Wolf Of Wall Street, in '94, '05, '07, and '14, respectively. And that's to say nothing of all the killer roles he's played that DIDN'T earn nominations.

But Leo is as passionate a philanthropist and environmentalist, that he could put the same energy into the Netflix docuseries that could earn him some more Academy nominations for the documentary category.

Of course, whatever happens, winning an Academy Award is not the most important thing in any actor, including DiCaprio's, career — but it's hard to deny the man doesn't deserve it at this point, and this new deal could absolutely be the key to it.

Images: Getty (2)