The Goya Awards are one of the most prestigious awards of the Seventh Art, as well as the most important award in Spanish cinema, which means that receiving a nomination for one of its categories is already a significant milestone. Receiving the winner’s statuette usually marks a before and after in the careers of many professionals in the industry, but apart from that there are those who wonder about the money that the winner of a Goya receives.
Contrary to what you might think, the winners do not receive any type of financial compensation, at least directly. In this way, we find honorary awards in which the nominees receive a diploma and the winners a trophy, but without money involved.
However, even if you do not receive any money for being the winners, having a Goya means being able to enjoy a series of direct and indirect benefits, among which the fact that the winners of the different categories, with the exception of the Original Song and those that are related to short films, receive an invitation to be part of the Film Academy as Numerary Members, without having to pay any entry fee. In turn, among the advantages of being an academic is being able to attend the Goya Awards with expenses paid.
However, the most interesting thing for the lucky ones is the professional projection they obtain thanks to their prize, since with it their cache increases and the possibilities of getting new job offers increase, whether they are artists, directors, technicians…, in addition to that successful films usually receive a big boost at the box office. However, although this happens in many cases, it has not always been the case and there are actors who have not managed to boost their careers despite winning the award.
How Goya winners are selected
Voting for the different categories of the Goya Awards is carried out in two rounds. In the first of them, a vote is carried out to select the different nominees in each of the categories, while in the second the winners are determined. In that first round, all members of the Academy with voting rights choose four nominees (five in some categories), while in the second round the winner of each award is chosen.
The jury for all categories is made up of members of the Film Academy, including Numerary Members with more than 6 months of service, Supernumerary Members and Honorary Members. In addition, Associate Members of the Academy with more than 6 months of seniority have the right to vote in some of the categories, such as best film, best documentary film and best animated film.
The awards ceremony maintains great secrecy, since the results of the voting are kept secret before a notary until the moment in which the public event is held for its announcement.
In order to be eligible for any of these awards, the film producers have to present their candidacy, for which they must meet a series of requirements, such as having a minimum duration depending on the category, having been released in Spain, in its original version, in commercial theaters and with a public box office between January 1 and December 31 of the year prior to the gala.