How Demi Moore overcame ‘bigoted’ and ‘anti-Demi’ power players to secure first Oscar nom

Demi Moore has garnered her very first Oscar nomination after overcoming ‘bigoted’ and ‘anti-Demi’ power players following her debut in the industry 40 years earlier. 

The actress, 62, scored her first Academy Award nod in January for her critically-acclaimed performance as Elisabeth Sparkle in the body horror film The Substance (2024).

It is Moore’s very first Oscar nom despite starring in a number of movies throughout her decades-long career in Hollywood such as St. Elmo’s Fire (1985), Ghost (1990), A Few Good Men (1992) and Indecent Proposal (1993). 

Demi’s former director, Roland Joffe, opened up to Page Six about the star’s path to her Best Actress nod ahead of the 2025 Oscars on Sunday, March 2. 

He notably directed Moore in the 1995 movie The Scarlet Letter – which was an adaptation of the 1850 novel of the same name written by Nathaniel Hawthorne and also starred Gary Oldman. 

Joffe recalled that an editor for an East Coast publication had told him insiders in the industry were less than thrilled that he had cast Demi in the lead role of Hester Prynne. 

According to Roland, the editor had informed him at the time ‘people felt that Demi had not earned the right to such a plum classic American role and suggested some other expected names’ for the role instead. 

The director was also told that he would ‘regret’ casting Moore in the historical drama. 

A few years earlier, the actress had posed naked on the cover of Vanity Fair in 1991 while pregnant with her daughter Scout. 

Joffe expressed that the editor – whose name was not disclosed – ‘suggested that Demi’s appearance on the cover of Vanity Fair, nude and pregnant, and the sensuality of her performances somehow disqualified her as a serious actress.’ 

One year after The Scarlet Letter was released, Moore starred in the 1996 movie Striptease. 

The premise is: ‘A stripper and single mother gets dragged into a dangerous situation after a congressman takes a fancy to her,’ per IMDB. 

Demi reportedly received $12.5 million for her role in the film – but she soon garnered backlash. 

Joffe expressed, ‘The anti-Demi feeling at the time was a sour mixture of jealousy at her physical freedom … and jealousy that she had become the highest paid female star.’

Last year, Moore also reflected on becoming the highest paid female actress at the time due to the payday for Striptease. 

While talking to the New York Times for its The Interview podcast, the actress stated, ‘Well, with Striptease, it was as if I had betrayed women, and with G.I. Jane, it was as if I had betrayed men. 

‘But I think the interesting piece is that when I became the highest-paid actress – why is it that, at that moment, the choice was to bring me down?’

She continued, ‘I don’t take this personally. I think anyone who had been in the position that was the first to get that kind of equality of pay would probably have taken a hit.

‘But because I did a film that was dealing with the world of stripping and the body, I was extremely shamed.’ 

Demi later added, ‘And it’s no different than when I did the cover for Vanity Fair pregnant. I didn’t understand why it was such a big deal, why women when they were pregnant needed to be hidden?

‘Why is it that we have to deny that we had sex? That’s the fear, right, that if you show your belly, that means, “Oh my gosh, you’ve had sex.”‘

Demi is up for an Academy Award for Best Actress, along with Cynthia Erivo (Wicked), Karla Sofia Gascon (Emilia Perez), Mikey Madison (Anora) and Fernanda Torres (I’m Still Here). 

Joffe stated, ‘I will defend Demi to the death, and I have been very upset that she doesn’t get the reputation she deserves, she’s an Academy standard actress.’ 

The filmmaker – who has directed other movies such as The Killing Fields and The Mission – added, ‘I’ve always said that working with her was an absolute joy.’ 

Earlier this year in January, Demi won a Golden Globe for Best Actress – and gave a moving speech as she recalled how a producer had once called her a ‘popcorn actress’ in the past.

Producer Andy Vajna is rumored to have made the comment, but Joffe shared that he did not believe it was Vajna – who passed away in 2019. 

While accepting the Golden Globe, Moore added she felt ‘this wasn’t something that I was allowed to have, that I could do movies that were successful, that made a lot of money, but that I couldn’t be acknowledged.’

‘And I bought in, and I believed that, and that corroded me over time, to the point where I thought a few years ago that maybe this was it, maybe I was complete, maybe I’ve done what I was supposed to do.’

She recalled, ‘And as I was at kind of a low point, I had this magical, bold, courageous, out of the box, absolutely bonkers script come across my desk called The Substance, and the universe told me that you’re not done…’

The actress concluded with, ‘I had a woman say to me, “Just know you will never be enough, but you can know the value of your worth if you just put down the measuring stick.”‘

‘And so today,’ Moore continued, ‘I celebrate this as a marker of my wholeness and of the love that is driving me and for the gift of doing something I love and being reminded that I do belong. Thank you so much.’ 

Last month, the beauty also received the Critics Choice Award for Best Actress. 

On stage she referenced to The Substance and said, ‘When I started the journey of this film, I could never imagine being here. This is so far beyond anything that I could have hoped for.’ 

Most recently, Demi also won a SAG Award for Best Actress and called the honor both ‘extraordinary’ and ‘meaningful.’

Later she also added, ‘I am so so grateful that I have continued over these so many years to be able to try and sometimes succeed and sometimes fail, but to be able to keep going.’ 

Towards the end, Moore emotionally expressed, ‘That little girl who didn’t believe in herself. The words are kind of beyond me, so I’m just gonna to have to just say thank you.’ 

Sources told Page Six that as the actress aged, she struggled to get cast in more projects, with one telling the outlet: ‘Demi didn’t get offered roles for many years – you just have to look at her IMDB page to see that.’

Before taking on her role in The Substance, Demi had thought her Hollywood career was ‘complete.’

She touched on the topic while accepting the Maria Manetti Shrem Award for Acting during the SFFILM Awards in San Francisco in December.

The star expressed, ‘I’ve had a very long career, but I haven’t really ever been part of the conversations that allowed me to be part of [awards shows] and to really receive the love and celebration of my work. I’m really just so humbled.

‘At the beginning of 2022, I had a moment where I was at an event and I felt I didn’t belong. I didn’t know why I was there. I wanted to be invisible and I couldn’t figure out how to get out.’

She added, ‘And I thought, “You know what? Maybe my time doing this is complete. Maybe I’ve done everything I was supposed to do.” … Two weeks later, the script for The Substance came across my desk.’

Demi admitted she had been ‘almost ready to step away’ but told the crowd that she was grateful she chose not to.

She also recently opened up to Backstage about receiving her very first Oscar nomination and said, ‘This is the biggest award for our industry; and in a way, it’s kind of everything and nothing.

‘That’s a weird thing to say, but it’s because it does, in some ways, mean everything; but at the same time, at ground zero, you don’t make choices based on that being the goal,’ Demi explained.

‘That’s the way for it not to work out. When you stay on a path that’s authentic to you and you’re doing meaningful, memorable work – speaking for myself, at least – that’s my drive.’