# Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay

The Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay is the Academy Award for the best screenplay adapted from previously established material. The most frequently adapted media are novels, but other adapted narrative formats include stage plays, musicals, short stories, TV series, and other films and film characters. All sequels are also considered adaptations by this standard, being based on the story and characters of the original film.
Prior to its current name, the award was known as the Academy Award for Best Screenplay Based On Material From Another Medium. The Best Adapted Screenplay category has been a part of the Academy Awards since their inception.

## Superlatives

The first person to win twice in this category was Joseph L. Mankiewicz, who won the award in two consecutive years, 1949 and 1950. Others to win twice in this category include George Seaton, Robert Bolt (who also won in consecutive years), Francis Ford Coppola, Mario Puzo, Alvin Sargent, Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Michael Wilson, Alexander Payne and Christopher Hampton. Payne won both awards as part of a writing team, with Jim Taylor for Sideways and Jim Rash and Nat Faxon for The Descendants. Michael Wilson was blacklisted at the time of his second Oscar, so the award was given to a front (novelist Pierre Boulle). However, the Academy officially recognized him as the winner several years later.
Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett, Paddy Chayefsky, Francis Ford Coppola, Horton Foote, William Goldman, Robert Benton, Bo Goldman, Waldo Salt, and the Coen brothers have won Oscars for both original and adapted screenplays.
Frances Marion (The Big House) was the first woman to win in any screenplay category, although she won for her original script for Best Writing, which then included both original and adapted screenplays before a separate award for Best Original Screenplay was introduced. Sarah Y. Mason (Little Women) was the first woman to win for adaptation from previously established material; she shared the award with her husband, Victor Heerman. They are also the first of two married couples to win in this category; Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh (The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King) are the others.
Pierre Collings and Sheridan Gibney (The Story of Louis Pasteur) were the first to win for adapting their own work.
Philip G. Epstein and Julius J. Epstein (Casablanca) are the first siblings to win in this category. James Goldman (The Lion in Winter) and William Goldman (All the President's Men) are the first siblings to win for separate films. Joel Coen and Ethan Coen (No Country for Old Men) are the third winning siblings.
Mario Puzo is the one of two writers whose work has been adapted and resulted in two wins. Puzo's novel The Godfather resulted in wins in 1972 and 1974 for himself and Francis Ford Coppola. The other is E. M. Forster, whose novels A Room with a View and Howards End resulted in wins for Ruth Prawer Jhabvala.
Larry McMurtry is the only person who has won for adapting someone else's work (Brokeback Mountain), and whose own work has been adapted by someone else, resulting in a win (Terms of Endearment).
William Monahan (The Departed) and Sian Heder (CODA) are the only people who have won this award by using another full-length feature film as the credited source of the adaptation.
Geoffrey S. Fletcher (Precious), John Ridley (12 Years a Slave) and Cord Jefferson (American Fiction) are the only African-Americans to win solo in this category; Fletcher is also the first African-American to win in any writing category. Barry Jenkins and Tarell Alvin McCraney (Moonlight) are the first African-American writing duo to win; Spike Lee and Kevin Willmott (BlacKkKlansman) are the second, although their co-writers, David Rabinowitz and Charlie Wachtel, are both white.
James Ivory (Call Me by Your Name) is the oldest person to receive the award at age 89. Charlie Wachtel (BlacKkKlansman) is the youngest at age 32.
Taika Waititi (Jojo Rabbit) is the first person of Māori descent to receive the award.
Emma Thompson (Sense and Sensibility) is the only winner who has also won for acting. Winners Billy Bob Thornton (Sling Blade) and John Huston (The Treasure of the Sierra Madre) have been nominated for acting but not won.
Charles Schnee (The Bad and the Beautiful), Billy Bob Thornton (Sling Blade), and Bill Condon (Gods and Monsters) are the only winners whose respective films were not nominated for Best Picture.

## Notable nominees

Noted novelists and playwrights nominated in this category include: George Bernard Shaw (who shared an award for an adaptation of his play Pygmalion), Graham Greene, Tennessee Williams, Vladimir Nabokov, James Hilton, Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Lillian Hellman, Irwin Shaw, James Agee, Norman Corwin, S. J. Perelman, Terence Rattigan, John Osborne, Robert Bolt, Harold Pinter, David Mamet, Larry McMurtry, Arthur Miller, John Irving, David Hare, Tony Kushner, August Wilson, Florian Zeller and Kazuo Ishiguro.
Ted Elliott, Roger S. H. Schulman, Joe Stillman & Terry Rossio, writers of Shrek and Michael Arndt, John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton & Lee Unkrich, writers of Toy Story 3, are as of 2020, the only writers to be nominated for an animated film.
Scott Frank, James Mangold and Michael Green, writers of Logan, are the first writers to be nominated for a film based on superhero comic books (the X-Men).

## Winners and nominees

Winners are listed first in colored row, followed by the other nominees.

### 1920s

| Year | Film | Nominees | Source Material |
| 1927/28 (1st) | 7th Heaven | Benjamin Glazer | The play Seventh Heaven by Austin Strong |
| 1927/28 (1st) | Glorious Betsy | Anthony Coldeway | The play by Rida Johnson Young |
| 1927/28 (1st) | The Jazz Singer | Alfred A. Cohn | The play & short story "The Day of Atonement" by Samson Raphaelson |
| 1928/29 (2nd) | The Patriot | Hanns Kräly | The novel by Alfred Neumann, play by Ashley Dukes & novel Paul I by Dmitry Merezhkovsky |
| 1928/29 (2nd) | The Cop | Elliott J. Clawson | – (original) |
| 1928/29 (2nd) | In Old Arizona | Tom Barry | The short story "The Caballero's Way" by O. Henry |
| 1928/29 (2nd) | The Last of Mrs. Cheyney | Hanns Kräly | The play by Frederick Lonsdale |
| 1928/29 (2nd) | The Leatherneck | Elliott J. Clawson | – (original) |
| 1928/29 (2nd) | Our Dancing Daughters | Josephine Lovett | – (original) |
| 1928/29 (2nd) | Sal of Singapore | Elliott J. Clawson | The novel The Sentimentalists by Dale Collins |
| 1928/29 (2nd) | Skyscraper | Elliott J. Clawson | A story by Dudley Murphy |
| 1928/29 (2nd) | The Valiant | Tom Barry | The play by Holworthy Hall & Robert Middlemass |
| 1928/29 (2nd) | A Woman of Affairs | Bess Meredyth | The novel The Green Hat by Michael Arlen |
| 1928/29 (2nd) | Wonder of Women | Bess Meredyth | The novel The Wife of Steffen Tromholt by Hermann Sudermann |

### 1930s

| Year | Film | Nominees | Source Material |
| 1929/30 (3rd) | The Big House | Frances Marion | – (original) |
| 1929/30 (3rd) | All Quiet on the Western Front | Screenplay: George Abbott; Adaptation: Maxwell Anderson & Del Andrews; Dialogue: Anderson | The novel by Erich Maria Remarque |
| 1929/30 (3rd) | Disraeli | Julien Josephson | The play by Louis N. Parker |
| 1929/30 (3rd) | The Divorcee | John Meehan | The novel Ex-Wife by Ursula Parrott |
| 1929/30 (3rd) | Street of Chance | Howard Estabrook | A story by Oliver H.P. Garrett |
| 1930/31 (4th) | Cimarron | Howard Estabrook | The novel by Edna Ferber |
| 1930/31 (4th) | The Criminal Code | Seton I. Miller & Fred Niblo Jr. | The play by Martin Flavin |
| 1930/31 (4th) | Holiday | Horace Jackson | The play by Philip Barry |
| 1930/31 (4th) | Little Caesar | Screenplay: Francis Edward Faragoh; Continuity: Robert N. Lee | The novel by W. R. Burnett |
| 1930/31 (4th) | Skippy | Joseph L. Mankiewicz & Sam Mintz | The comic strip by Percy Crosby |
| 1931/32 (5th) | Bad Girl | Edwin J. Burke | The novel by Viña Delmar and play by Delmar and Brian Marlowe |
| 1931/32 (5th) | Arrowsmith | Sidney Howard | The novel by Sinclair Lewis |
| 1931/32 (5th) | Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde | Percy Heath & Samuel Hoffenstein | The novella Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson |
| 1932/33 (6th) | Little Women | Victor Heerman & Sarah Y. Mason | The novel by Louisa May Alcott |
| 1932/33 (6th) | Lady for a Day | Robert Riskin | The short story "Madame La Gimp" by Damon Runyon |
| 1932/33 (6th) | State Fair | Paul Green & Sonya Levien | The novel by Phil Stong |
| 1934 (7th) | It Happened One Night | Robert Riskin | The short story "Night Bus" by Samuel Hopkins Adams |
| 1934 (7th) | The Thin Man | Frances Goodrich & Albert Hackett | The novel by Dashiell Hammett |
| 1934 (7th) | Viva Villa! | Ben Hecht | The book Viva Villa! A Recovery of the Real Pancho Villa, Peon, Bandit, Soldier, Patriot by Edgecumb Pinchon & O. B. Stade |
| 1935 (8th) | The Informer | Dudley Nichols | The novel by Liam O'Flaherty |
| 1935 (8th) | The Lives of a Bengal Lancer | Screenplay: Achmed Abdullah, John L. Balderston & Waldemar Young; Adaptation: Grover Jones & William Slavens McNutt | The memoir by Francis Yeats-Brown |
| 1935 (8th) | Mutiny on the Bounty | Jules Furthman, Talbot Jennings & Carey Wilson | The novel by James Norman Hall & Charles Nordhoff |
| 1936 (9th) | The Story of Louis Pasteur | Pierre Collings & Sheridan Gibney | (original) |
| 1936 (9th) | After the Thin Man | Frances Goodrich & Albert Hackett | The novel The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett |
| 1936 (9th) | Dodsworth | Sidney Howard | The play by Howard & novel by Sinclair Lewis |
| 1936 (9th) | Mr. Deeds Goes to Town | Robert Riskin | The short story "Opera Hat" by Bud Kelland |
| 1936 (9th) | My Man Godfrey | Eric S. Hatch & Morrie Ryskind | The novel 1101 Park Avenue by Hatch |
| 1937 (10th) | The Life of Emile Zola | Heinz Herald, Geza Herczeg & Norman Reilly Raine | The book Zola and His Time by Matthew Josephson |
| 1937 (10th) | The Awful Truth | Viña Delmar | The play by Arthur Richman |
| 1937 (10th) | Captains Courageous | Marc Connelly, Dale Van Every & John Lee Mahin | The novel Captain Courageous: A Story of the Grand Banks by Rudyard Kipling |
| 1937 (10th) | Stage Door | Morrie Ryskind & Anthony Veiller | The play by Edna Ferber & George S. Kaufman |
| 1937 (10th) | A Star Is Born | Alan Campbell, Robert Carson & Dorothy Parker | A story by William A. Wellman & Carson |
| 1938 (11th) | Pygmalion | Screenplay & Dialogue: George Bernard Shaw; Adaptation: Ian Dalrymple, Cecil Arthur Lewis & W. P. Lipscomb | The play by Shaw |
| 1938 (11th) | Boys Town | John Meehan & Dore Schary | A story by Schary & Eleanore Griffin |
| 1938 (11th) | The Citadel | Dalrymple, Betty Hill & Spig Wead | The novel by A. J. Cronin |
| 1938 (11th) | Four Daughters | Lenore Coffee & Julius J. Epstein | The short story "Sister Act" by Fannie Hurst |
| 1938 (11th) | You Can't Take It with You | Robert Riskin | The play by George S. Kaufman & Moss Hart |
| 1939 (12th) | Gone with the Wind | Sidney Howard (p.r.) | The novel by Margaret Mitchell |
| 1939 (12th) | Goodbye, Mr. Chips | Holt Marvell, R. C. Sherriff & Claudine West | The novella by James Hilton |
| 1939 (12th) | Mr. Smith Goes to Washington | Sidney Buchman | A story by Lewis R. Foster |
| 1939 (12th) | Ninotchka | Charles Brackett, Walter Reisch & Billy Wilder | A story by Melchior Lengyel |
| 1939 (12th) | Wuthering Heights | Ben Hecht & Charles MacArthur | The novel by Emily Brontë |

### 1940s

| Year | Film | Nominees | Source Material |
| 1940 (13th) | The Philadelphia Story | Donald Ogden Stewart | The play by Philip Barry |
| 1940 (13th) | The Grapes of Wrath | Nunnally Johnson | The novel by John Steinbeck |
| 1940 (13th) | Kitty Foyle | Dalton Trumbo | The novel by Christopher Morley |
| 1940 (13th) | The Long Voyage Home | Dudley Nichols | The plays The Moon of the Caribees, In the Zone, Bound East for Cardiff & The Long Voyage Home by Eugene O'Neill |
| 1940 (13th) | Rebecca | Joan Harrison & Robert E. Sherwood | The novel by Daphne du Maurier |
| 1941 (14th) | Here Comes Mr. Jordan | Sidney Buchman & Seton I. Miller | The play Heaven Can Wait by Harry Segall |
| 1941 (14th) | Hold Back the Dawn | Charles Brackett & Billy Wilder | The novel by Ketti Frings |
| 1941 (14th) | How Green Was My Valley | Philip Dunne | The novel by Richard Llewellyn |
| 1941 (14th) | The Little Foxes | Lillian Hellman | The play by Hellman |
| 1941 (14th) | The Maltese Falcon | John Huston | The novel by Dashiell Hammett |
| 1942 (15th) | Mrs. Miniver | George Froeschel, James Hilton, Claudine West & Arthur Wimperis | The character Mrs. Miniver from the articles by Jan Struther |
| 1942 (15th) | 49th Parallel | Rodney Ackland & Emeric Pressburger | A story by Pressburger |
| 1942 (15th) | The Pride of the Yankees | Herman J. Mankiewicz & Jo Swerling | A story by Paul Gallico |
| 1942 (15th) | Random Harvest | Froeschel, West & Wimperis | The novel by Hilton |
| 1942 (15th) | The Talk of the Town | Sidney Buchman & Irwin Shaw | A story by Sidney Harmon |
| 1943 (16th) | Casablanca | Philip G. Epstein, Julius J. Epstein & Howard Koch | The play Everybody Comes to Rick's by Joan Alison & Murray Burnett |
| 1943 (16th) | Holy Matrimony | Nunnally Johnson | The novel Buried Alive by Arnold Bennett |
| 1943 (16th) | The More the Merrier | Richard Flournoy, Lewis R. Foster, Frank Ross & Robert W. Russell | A story by Ross & Russell |
| 1943 (16th) | The Song of Bernadette | George Seaton | The novel by Franz Werfel |
| 1943 (16th) | Watch on the Rhine | Dashiell Hammett | The play by Lillian Hellman |
| 1944 (17th) | Going My Way | Frank Butler & Frank Cavett | A story by Leo McCarey |
| 1944 (17th) | Double Indemnity | Raymond Chandler & Billy Wilder | The novel Double Indemnity in Three of a Kind by James M. Cain |
| 1944 (17th) | Gaslight | John L. Balderston, Walter Reisch & John Van Druten | The play Gas Light by Patrick Hamilton |
| 1944 (17th) | Laura | Jay Dratler, Samuel Hoffenstein & Elizabeth Reinhardt | The novel by Vera Caspary |
| 1944 (17th) | Meet Me in St. Louis | Irving Brecher & Fred F. Finklehoffe | The novel by Sally Benson |
| 1945 (18th) | The Lost Weekend | Charles Brackett & Billy Wilder | The novel by Charles R. Jackson |
| 1945 (18th) | G. I. Joe | Leopold Atlas, Guy Endore & Philip Stevenson | The memoirs Brave Men & Here Is Your War by Ernie Pyle |
| 1945 (18th) | Mildred Pierce | Ranald MacDougall | The novel by James M. Cain |
| 1945 (18th) | Pride of the Marines | Albert Maltz | The book Al Schmid, Marine by Roger Butterfield |
| 1945 (18th) | A Tree Grows in Brooklyn | Frank Davis & Tess Slesinger (p.n.) | The novel by Betty Smith |
| 1946 (19th) | The Best Years of Our Lives | Robert E. Sherwood | The novella Glory for Me by MacKinlay Kantor |
| 1946 (19th) | Anna and the King of Siam | Sally Benson & Talbot Jennings | The novel by Margaret Landon |
| 1946 (19th) | Brief Encounter | Anthony Havelock-Allan, David Lean & Ronald Neame | The play Still Life by Noël Coward |
| 1946 (19th) | The Killers | Anthony Veiller | The short story by Ernest Hemingway |
| 1946 (19th) | Rome, Open City | Sergio Amidei & Federico Fellini | A story by Amidei & Alberto Consiglio |
| 1947 (20th) | Miracle on 34th Street | George Seaton | A story by Valentine Davies |
| 1947 (20th) | Boomerang | Richard Murphy | The article "The Perfect Case" by Anthony Abbot |
| 1947 (20th) | Crossfire | John Paxton | The novel The Brick Foxhole by Richard Brooks |
| 1947 (20th) | Gentleman's Agreement | Moss Hart | The novel by Laura Z. Hobson |
| 1947 (20th) | Great Expectations | David Lean, Anthony Havelock-Allan, & Ronald Neame | The novel by Charles Dickens |
| 1948 (21st) | The Treasure of the Sierra Madre | John Huston | The novel by B. Traven |
| 1948 (21st) | A Foreign Affair | Charles Brackett, Richard L. Breen & Billy Wilder | A story by David Shaw |
| 1948 (21st) | Johnny Belinda | Allen Vincent & Irma von Cube | The play by Elmer Blaney Harris |
| 1948 (21st) | The Search | Richard Schweizer & David Wechsler [de] | – (original screenplay) |
| 1948 (21st) | The Snake Pit | Millen Brand & Frank Partos | The novel by Mary Jane Ward |
| 1949 (22nd) | A Letter to Three Wives | Joseph L. Mankiewicz | The novel by John Klempner |
| 1949 (22nd) | All the King's Men | Robert Rossen | The novel by Robert Penn Warren |
| 1949 (22nd) | The Bicycle Thief | Cesare Zavattini | The novel by Luigi Bartolini |
| 1949 (22nd) | Champion | Carl Foreman | The short story by Ring Lardner |
| 1949 (22nd) | The Fallen Idol | Graham Greene | The short story "The Basement Room" by Greene |

### 1950s

| Year | Film | Nominees | Source Material |
| 1950 (23rd) | All About Eve | Joseph L. Mankiewicz | The short story "The Wisdom of Eve" by Mary Orr |
| 1950 (23rd) | The Asphalt Jungle | John Huston & Ben Maddow | The novel by W. R. Burnett |
| 1950 (23rd) | Born Yesterday | Albert Mannheimer | The play by Garson Kanin |
| 1950 (23rd) | Broken Arrow | Albert Maltz | The novel Blood Brother by Elliott Arnold |
| 1950 (23rd) | Father of the Bride | Frances Goodrich & Albert Hackett | The novel by E. Streeter |
| 1951 (24th) | A Place in the Sun | Harry Brown & Michael Wilson | The novel An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser & play by Patrick Kearney |
| 1951 (24th) | The African Queen | James Agee & John Huston | The novel by C. S. Forester |
| 1951 (24th) | Detective Story | Robert Wyler & Philip Yordan | The play by Sidney Kingsley |
| 1951 (24th) | La Ronde | Jacques Natanson & Max Ophüls | The play by Arthur Schnitzler |
| 1951 (24th) | A Streetcar Named Desire | Tennessee Williams | The play by Williams |
| 1952 (25th) | The Bad and the Beautiful | Charles Schnee | A story by George Bradshaw |
| 1952 (25th) | 5 Fingers | Michael Wilson | The novel Operation Cicero by Ludwig Carl Moyzisch |
| 1952 (25th) | High Noon | Carl Foreman | The short story "The Tin Star" by John W. Cunningham |
| 1952 (25th) | The Man in the White Suit | John Dighton, Alexander Mackendrick & Roger MacDougall | A story by MacDougall |
| 1952 (25th) | The Quiet Man | Frank Nugent | The short story by Maurice Walsh |
| 1953 (26th) | From Here to Eternity | Daniel Taradash | The novel by James Jones |
| 1953 (26th) | The Cruel Sea | Eric Ambler | The novel by Nicholas Monsarrat |
| 1953 (26th) | Lili | Helen Deutsch | The short story "The Man Who Hated People" by Paul Gallico |
| 1953 (26th) | Roman Holiday | John Dighton & Ian McLellan Hunter | A story by Dalton Trumbo (front: Ian McLellan Hunter) |
| 1953 (26th) | Shane | A. B. Guthrie Jr. | The novel by Jack Schaefer |
| 1954 (27th) | The Country Girl | George Seaton | The play by Clifford Odets |
| 1954 (27th) | The Caine Mutiny | Stanley Roberts | The novel by Herman Wouk |
| 1954 (27th) | Rear Window | John Michael Hayes | The short story "It Had to Be Murder" by Cornell Woolrich |
| 1954 (27th) | Sabrina | Ernest Lehman, Samuel A. Taylor & Billy Wilder | The play Sabrina Fair by Taylor |
| 1954 (27th) | Seven Brides for Seven Brothers | Frances Goodrich, Albert Hackett & Dorothy Kingsley | The short story "The Sobbin' Women" by Stephen Vincent Benét |
| 1955 (28th) | Marty | Paddy Chayefsky | The television play on The Philco Television Playhouse by Chayefsky |
| 1955 (28th) | Bad Day at Black Rock | Millard Kaufman | The short story "Bad Time at Honda" by Howard Breslin |
| 1955 (28th) | Blackboard Jungle | Richard Brooks | The novel by Evan Hunter |
| 1955 (28th) | East of Eden | Paul Osborn | The novel by John Steinbeck |
| 1955 (28th) | Love Me or Leave Me | Daniel Fuchs & Isobel Lennart | A story by Fuchs |
| 1956 (29th) | Around the World in 80 Days | John Farrow, S. J. Perelman & James Poe | The novel by Jules Verne |
| 1956 (29th) | Baby Doll | Tennessee Williams | The plays 27 Wagons Full of Cotton & The Long Stay Cut Short, or The Unsatisfactory Supper by Williams |
| 1956 (29th) | Friendly Persuasion | Michael Wilson | The novel by Jessamyn West |
| 1956 (29th) | Giant | Fred Guiol & Ivan Moffat | The novel by Edna Ferber |
| 1956 (29th) | Lust for Life | Norman Corwin | The novel by Irving Stone |
| 1957 (30th) | The Bridge on the River Kwai | Pierre Boulle, Carl Foreman, & Michael Wilson | The novel The Bridge over the River Kwai by Boulle |
| 1957 (30th) | 12 Angry Men | Reginald Rose | The teleplay on Westinghouse Studio One and play by Rose |
| 1957 (30th) | Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison | John Huston & John Lee Mahin | The novel by Charles Shaw |
| 1957 (30th) | Peyton Place | John Michael Hayes | The novel by Grace Metalious |
| 1957 (30th) | Sayonara | Paul Osborn | The novel by James A. Michener |
| 1958 (31st) | Gigi | Alan Jay Lerner | The novella by Colette |
| 1958 (31st) | Cat on a Hot Tin Roof | Richard Brooks & James Poe | The play & short story "Three Players of a Summer Game" by Tennessee Williams |
| 1958 (31st) | The Horse's Mouth | Alec Guinness | The novel by Joyce Cary |
| 1958 (31st) | I Want to Live! | Nelson Gidding & Don Mankiewicz | Articles by Edward S. Montgomery & letters by Barbara Graham |
| 1958 (31st) | Separate Tables | John Gay & Terence Rattigan | The plays by Rattigan |
| 1959 (32nd) | Room at the Top | Neil Paterson | The novel by John Braine |
| 1959 (32nd) | Anatomy of a Murder | Wendell Mayes | The novel by John D. Voelker |
| 1959 (32nd) | Ben-Hur | Karl Tunberg | The novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ by Lew Wallace |
| 1959 (32nd) | The Nun's Story | Robert Anderson | The novel by Kathryn Hulme |
| 1959 (32nd) | Some Like It Hot | I. A. L. Diamond & Billy Wilder | The 1935 French film Fanfare of Love written by Max Bronnet, Michael Logan, Pierre Prévert, René Pujol and Robert Thoeren & the 1951 German remake Fanfares of Love written by Logan, Thoeren and Heinz Pauck |

### 1960s

| Year | Film | Nominees | Source Material |
| 1960 (33rd) | Elmer Gantry | Richard Brooks | The novel by Sinclair Lewis |
| 1960 (33rd) | Inherit the Wind | Harold Jacob Smith & Nedrick Young | The play by Jerome Lawrence & Robert E. Lee |
| 1960 (33rd) | Sons and Lovers | T. E. B. Clarke & Gavin Lambert | The novel by D. H. Lawrence |
| 1960 (33rd) | The Sundowners | Isobel Lennart | The novel by Jon Cleary |
| 1960 (33rd) | Tunes of Glory | James Kennaway | The novel by Kennaway |
| 1961 (34th) | Judgment at Nuremberg | Abby Mann | The television play on Playhouse 90 by Mann |
| 1961 (34th) | Breakfast at Tiffany's | George Axelrod | The novella by Truman Capote |
| 1961 (34th) | The Guns of Navarone | Carl Foreman | The novel by Alistair MacLean |
| 1961 (34th) | The Hustler | Sidney Carroll & Robert Rossen | The novel by Walter Tevis |
| 1961 (34th) | West Side Story | Ernest Lehman | The musical by Arthur Laurents |
| 1962 (35th) | To Kill a Mockingbird | Horton Foote | The novel by Harper Lee |
| 1962 (35th) | David and Lisa | Eleanor Perry | The novella Lisa and David by Dr. Theodore Isaac Rubin |
| 1962 (35th) | Lawrence of Arabia | Robert Bolt & Michael Wilson | The memoir Seven Pillars of Wisdom by T. E. Lawrence |
| 1962 (35th) | Lolita | Vladimir Nabokov | The novel by Nabokov |
| 1962 (35th) | The Miracle Worker | William Gibson | The play & television play on Playhouse 90 by Gibson |
| 1963 (36th) | Tom Jones | John Osborne | The novel The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling by Henry Fielding |
| 1963 (36th) | Captain Newman, M.D. | Richard L. Breen, Henry & Phoebe Ephron | The novel by Leo Rosten |
| 1963 (36th) | Hud | Harriet Frank Jr. & Irving Ravetch | The novel Horseman, Pass By by Larry McMurtry |
| 1963 (36th) | Lilies of the Field | James Poe | The novel by William Edmund Barrett |
| 1963 (36th) | Sundays and Cybele | Scenario: Serge Bourguignon & Antoine Tudal; Dialogue: Bourguignon | The novel Les dimanches de Ville d'Avray by Bernard Eschassériaux |
| 1964 (37th) | Becket | Edward Anhalt | The play by Jean Anouilh |
| 1964 (37th) | Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb | Stanley Kubrick, Peter George & Terry Southern | The novel Red Alert by George |
| 1964 (37th) | Mary Poppins | Don DaGradi & Bill Walsh | The novel series by P. L. Travers |
| 1964 (37th) | My Fair Lady | Alan Jay Lerner | The musical by Lerner |
| 1964 (37th) | Zorba the Greek | Michael Cacoyannis | The novel by Nikos Kazantzakis |
| 1965 (38th) | Doctor Zhivago | Robert Bolt | The novel by Boris Pasternak |
| 1965 (38th) | Cat Ballou | Walter Newman & Frank Pierson | The novel The Ballad of Cat Ballou by Roy Chanslor |
| 1965 (38th) | The Collector | John Kohn & Stanley Mann | The novel by John Fowles |
| 1965 (38th) | Ship of Fools | Abby Mann | The novel by Katherine Anne Porter |
| 1965 (38th) | A Thousand Clowns | Herb Gardner | The play by Gardner |
| 1966 (39th) | A Man for All Seasons | Robert Bolt | The play by Bolt |
| 1966 (39th) | Alfie | Bill Naughton | The play by Naughton |
| 1966 (39th) | The Professionals | Richard Brooks | The novel A Mule for the Marquesa by Frank O'Rourke |
| 1966 (39th) | The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming | William Rose | The novel The Off-Islanders by Nathaniel Benchley |
| 1966 (39th) | Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? | Ernest Lehman | The play by Edward Albee |
| 1967 (40th) | In the Heat of the Night | Stirling Silliphant | The novel by John Ball |
| 1967 (40th) | Cool Hand Luke | Donn Pearce & Frank Pierson | The novel by Pearce |
| 1967 (40th) | The Graduate | Buck Henry & Calder Willingham | The novella by Charles Webb |
| 1967 (40th) | In Cold Blood | Richard Brooks | The book by Truman Capote |
| 1967 (40th) | Ulysses | Fred Haines & Joseph Strick | The novel by James Joyce |
| 1968 (41st) | The Lion in Winter | James Goldman | The play by Goldman |
| 1968 (41st) | The Odd Couple | Neil Simon | The play by Simon |
| 1968 (41st) | Oliver! | Vernon Harris | The musical by Lionel Bart |
| 1968 (41st) | Rachel, Rachel | Stewart Stern | The novel A Jest of God by Margaret Laurence |
| 1968 (41st) | Rosemary's Baby | Roman Polanski | The novel by Ira Levin |
| 1969 (42nd) | Midnight Cowboy | Waldo Salt | The novel by James Leo Herlihy |
| 1969 (42nd) | Anne of the Thousand Days | Screenplay: Bridget Boland & John Hale; Adaptation: Richard Sokolove | The play by Maxwell Anderson |
| 1969 (42nd) | Goodbye, Columbus | Arnold Schulman | The novella by Philip Roth |
| 1969 (42nd) | They Shoot Horses, Don't They? | James Poe & Robert E. Thompson | The novel by Horace McCoy |
| 1969 (42nd) | Z | Costa-Gavras & Jorge Semprún | The novel by Vassilis Vassilikos |

### 1970s

| Year | Film | Nominees | Source Material |
| 1970 (43rd) | M*A*S*H | Ring Lardner Jr. | The novel MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors by Richard Hooker |
| 1970 (43rd) | Airport | George Seaton | The novel by Arthur Hailey |
| 1970 (43rd) | I Never Sang for My Father | Robert Anderson | The play by Anderson |
| 1970 (43rd) | Lovers and Other Strangers | Joseph Bologna, David Zelag Goodman & Renée Taylor | The play by Bologna & Taylor |
| 1970 (43rd) | Women in Love | Larry Kramer | The novel by D. H. Lawrence |
| 1971 (44th) | The French Connection | Ernest Tidyman | The book The French Connection: The World's Most Crucial Narcotics Investigation by Robin Moore |
| 1971 (44th) | A Clockwork Orange | Stanley Kubrick | The novel by Anthony Burgess |
| 1971 (44th) | The Conformist | Bernardo Bertolucci | The novel by Alberto Moravia |
| 1971 (44th) | The Garden of the Finzi-Continis | Vittorio Bonicelli & Ugo Pirro | The novel by Giorgio Bassani |
| 1971 (44th) | The Last Picture Show | Peter Bogdanovich & Larry McMurtry | The novel by McMurtry |
| 1972 (45th) | The Godfather | Francis Ford Coppola & Mario Puzo | The novel by Puzo |
| 1972 (45th) | Cabaret | Jay Presson Allen | The musical by Joe Masteroff |
| 1972 (45th) | The Emigrants | Bengt Forslund & Jan Troell | The novels The Emigrants & Unto a Good Land by Vilhelm Moberg |
| 1972 (45th) | Pete 'n' Tillie | Julius J. Epstein | The novella Witch's Milk by Peter De Vries |
| 1972 (45th) | Sounder | Lonne Elder III | The novel by William H. Armstrong |
| 1973 (46th) | The Exorcist | William Peter Blatty | The novel by Blatty |
| 1973 (46th) | The Last Detail | Robert Towne | The novel by Darryl Ponicsan |
| 1973 (46th) | The Paper Chase | James Bridges | The novel by John Jay Osborn Jr. |
| 1973 (46th) | Paper Moon | Alvin Sargent | The novel Addie Pray by Joe David Brown |
| 1973 (46th) | Serpico | Waldo Salt & Norman Wexler | The book Serpico: The Cop Who Defied the System by Peter Maas |
| 1974 (47th) | The Godfather Part II | Francis Ford Coppola & Mario Puzo | The novel The Godfather by Puzo |
| 1974 (47th) | The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz | Screenplay: Mordecai Richler; Adaptation: Lionel Chetwynd | The novel by Richler |
| 1974 (47th) | Lenny | Julian Barry | The play by Barry |
| 1974 (47th) | Murder on the Orient Express | Paul Dehn | The novel by Agatha Christie |
| 1974 (47th) | Young Frankenstein | Mel Brooks & Gene Wilder | The novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus by Mary Shelley |
| 1975 (48th) | One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest | Bo Goldman & Lawrence Hauben | The novel by Ken Kesey |
| 1975 (48th) | Barry Lyndon | Stanley Kubrick | The novel The Luck of Barry Lyndon by William Makepeace Thackeray |
| 1975 (48th) | The Man Who Would Be King | Gladys Hill & John Huston | The short story by Rudyard Kipling |
| 1975 (48th) | Profumo di donna | Ruggero Maccari & Dino Risi | The novel Il buio e il mare by Giovanni Arpino |
| 1975 (48th) | The Sunshine Boys | Neil Simon | The play by Simon |
| 1976 (49th) | All the President's Men | William Goldman | The memoir by Carl Bernstein & Bob Woodward |
| 1976 (49th) | Bound for Glory | Robert Getchell | The memoir by Woody Guthrie |
| 1976 (49th) | Fellini's Casanova | Federico Fellini & Bernardino Zapponi | The memoir History of My Life by Giacomo Casanova |
| 1976 (49th) | The Seven-Per-Cent Solution | Nicholas Meyer | The novel The Seven-Per-Cent Solution: Being a Reprint from the Reminiscences of John H. Watson, M.D. by Meyer |
| 1976 (49th) | Voyage of the Damned | David Butler & Steve Shagan | The book by Gordon Thomas & Max Morgan-Witts |
| 1977 (50th) | Julia | Alvin Sargent | The memoir Pentimento: A Book of Portraits by Lillian Hellman |
| 1977 (50th) | Equus | Peter Shaffer | The play by Shaffer |
| 1977 (50th) | I Never Promised You a Rose Garden | Lewis John Carlino & Gavin Lambert | The novel by Joanne Greenberg |
| 1977 (50th) | Oh, God! | Larry Gelbart | The novel by Avery Corman |
| 1977 (50th) | That Obscure Object of Desire | Scenario: Luis Buñuel; Collaboration: Jean-Claude Carrière | The novel The Woman and the Puppet by Pierre Louÿs |
| 1978 (51st) | Midnight Express | Oliver Stone | The memoir by Billy Hayes & William Hoffer |
| 1978 (51st) | Bloodbrothers | Walter Newman | The novel by Richard Price |
| 1978 (51st) | California Suite | Neil Simon | The play by Simon |
| 1978 (51st) | Heaven Can Wait | Warren Beatty & Elaine May | The play by Harry Segall |
| 1978 (51st) | Same Time, Next Year | Bernard Slade | The play by Slade |
| 1979 (52nd) | Kramer vs. Kramer | Robert Benton | The novel by Avery Corman |
| 1979 (52nd) | Apocalypse Now | Francis Ford Coppola & John Milius | The novel Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad |
| 1979 (52nd) | La Cage aux Folles | Marcello Danon, Édouard Molinaro, Jean Poiret & Francis Veber | The play by Poiret |
| 1979 (52nd) | A Little Romance | Allan Burns | The novel E=mc$^2$ Mon Amour by Patrick Cauvin |
| 1979 (52nd) | Norma Rae | Harriet Frank Jr. & Irving Ravetch | The book Crystal Lee, a Woman of Inheritance by Hank Leiferman |

### 1980s

| Year | Film | Nominees | Source Material |
| 1980 (53rd) | Ordinary People | Alvin Sargent | The novel by Judith Guest |
| 1980 (53rd) | Breaker Morant | Bruce Beresford, Jonathan Hardy & David Stevens | The play Breaker Morant: A Play in Two Acts by Kenneth G. Ross |
| 1980 (53rd) | Coal Miner's Daughter | Thomas Rickman | The memoir Loretta Lynn: Coal Miner's Daughter by Loretta Lynn & George Vecsey |
| 1980 (53rd) | The Elephant Man | Eric Bergren, Christopher De Vore & David Lynch | The memoir The Elephant Man and Other Reminiscences by Frederick Treves & book The Elephant Man: A Study in Human Dignity by Ashley Montagu |
| 1980 (53rd) | The Stunt Man | Screenplay: Lawrence B. Marcus; Adaptation: Richard Rush | The novel by Paul Brodeur |
| 1981 (54th) | On Golden Pond | Ernest Thompson | The play by Thompson |
| 1981 (54th) | The French Lieutenant's Woman | Harold Pinter | The novel by John Fowles |
| 1981 (54th) | Pennies from Heaven | Dennis Potter | The television series by Potter |
| 1981 (54th) | Prince of the City | Jay Presson Allen & Sidney Lumet | The book Prince of the City: The True Story of a Cop Who Knew Too Much by Robert Daley |
| 1981 (54th) | Ragtime | Michael Weller | The novel by E. L. Doctorow |
| 1982 (55th) | Missing | Costa-Gavras & Donald E. Stewart | The book The Execution of Charles Horman: An American Sacrifice by Thomas Hauser |
| 1982 (55th) | Das Boot | Wolfgang Petersen | The novel by Lothar-Günther Buchheim |
| 1982 (55th) | Sophie's Choice | Alan J. Pakula | The novel by William Styron |
| 1982 (55th) | The Verdict | David Mamet | The novel by Barry Reed |
| 1982 (55th) | Victor/Victoria | Blake Edwards | The film Victor and Victoria by Reinhold Schünzel |
| 1983 (56th) | Terms of Endearment | James L. Brooks | The novel by Larry McMurtry |
| 1983 (56th) | Betrayal | Harold Pinter | The play by Pinter |
| 1983 (56th) | The Dresser | Ronald Harwood | The play by Harwood |
| 1983 (56th) | Educating Rita | Willy Russell | The play by Russell |
| 1983 (56th) | Reuben, Reuben | Julius J. Epstein | The play Spofford by Herman Shumlin & novel by Peter De Vries |
| 1984 (57th) | Amadeus | Peter Shaffer | The play by Shaffer |
| 1984 (57th) | Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes | Michael Austin & Robert Towne | The novel Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs |
| 1984 (57th) | The Killing Fields | Bruce Robinson | The article "The Death and Life of Dith Pran: A Story of Cambodia" by Sydney Schanberg |
| 1984 (57th) | A Passage to India | David Lean | The novel by E. M. Forster |
| 1984 (57th) | A Soldier's Story | Charles Fuller | The play A Soldier's Play by Fuller |
| 1985 (58th) | Out of Africa | Kurt Luedtke | The memoir by Karen Blixen & books Silence Will Speak: A Study of the Life of Denys Finch Hatton and His Relationship With Karen Blixen by Errol Trzebinski & Isak Dinesen: The Life of a Storyteller by Judith Thurman |
| 1985 (58th) | The Color Purple | Menno Meyjes | The novel by Alice Walker |
| 1985 (58th) | Kiss of the Spider Woman | Leonard Schrader | The novel by Manuel Puig |
| 1985 (58th) | Prizzi's Honor | Richard Condon & Janet Roach | The novel by Condon |
| 1985 (58th) | The Trip to Bountiful | Horton Foote | The play & television film by Foote |
| 1986 (59th) | A Room with a View | Ruth Prawer Jhabvala | The novel by E. M. Forster |
| 1986 (59th) | Children of a Lesser God | Hesper Anderson & Mark Medoff | The play by Medoff |
| 1986 (59th) | The Color of Money | Richard Price | The novel by Walter Tevis |
| 1986 (59th) | Crimes of the Heart | Beth Henley | The play by Henley |
| 1986 (59th) | Stand by Me | Bruce A. Evans & Raynold Gideon | The novella The Body by Stephen King |
| 1987 (60th) | The Last Emperor | Bernardo Bertolucci & Mark Peploe | The memoir From Emperor to Citizen: The Autobiography of Aisin-Gioro Pu Yi by Puyi |
| 1987 (60th) | The Dead | Tony Huston | The short story by James Joyce |
| 1987 (60th) | Fatal Attraction | James Dearden | The television film Diversion by Dearden |
| 1987 (60th) | Full Metal Jacket | Gustav Hasford, Michael Herr & Stanley Kubrick | The novel The Short-Timers by Hasford |
| 1987 (60th) | My Life as a Dog | Per Berglund, Brasse Brännström, Lasse Hallström & Reidar Jönsson | The novel Mitt liv som hund by Jönsson |
| 1988 (61st) | Dangerous Liaisons | Christopher Hampton | The play Les Liaisons Dangereuses by Hampton & novel by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos |
| 1988 (61st) | The Accidental Tourist | Frank Galati & Lawrence Kasdan | The novel by Anne Tyler |
| 1988 (61st) | Gorillas in the Mist | Screenplay: Anna Hamilton Phelan; Story: Tab Murphy & Phelon | The article by Harold Hayes |
| 1988 (61st) | Little Dorrit | Christine Edzard | The novel by Charles Dickens |
| 1988 (61st) | The Unbearable Lightness of Being | Jean-Claude Carrière & Philip Kaufman | The novel by Milan Kundera |
| 1989 (62nd) | Driving Miss Daisy | Alfred Uhry | The play by Uhry |
| 1989 (62nd) | Born on the Fourth of July | Ron Kovic & Oliver Stone | The memoir by Kovic |
| 1989 (62nd) | Enemies, A Love Story | Paul Mazursky & Roger L. Simon | The novel by Isaac Bashevis Singer |
| 1989 (62nd) | Field of Dreams | Phil Alden Robinson | The novel Shoeless Joe by W. P. Kinsella |
| 1989 (62nd) | My Left Foot | Shane Connaughton & Jim Sheridan | The memoir by Christy Brown |

### 1990s

| Year | Film | Nominees | Source Material |
| 1990 (63rd) | Dances with Wolves | Michael Blake | The novel by Blake |
| 1990 (63rd) | Awakenings | Steven Zaillian | The memoir by Oliver Sacks |
| 1990 (63rd) | Goodfellas | Nicholas Pileggi & Martin Scorsese | The book Wiseguy: Life in a Mafia Family by Pileggi |
| 1990 (63rd) | The Grifters | Donald E. Westlake | The novel by Jim Thompson |
| 1990 (63rd) | Reversal of Fortune | Nicholas Kazan | The memoir Reversal of Fortune: Inside the von Bülow Case by Alan Dershowitz |
| 1991 (64th) | The Silence of the Lambs | Ted Tally | The novel by Thomas Harris |
| 1991 (64th) | Europa Europa | Agnieszka Holland | The memoir I Was Hitler Youth Salomon by Solomon Perel |
| 1991 (64th) | Fried Green Tomatoes | Fannie Flagg & Carol Sobieski (p.n.) | The novel Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe by Flagg |
| 1991 (64th) | JFK | Zachary Sklar & Oliver Stone | The memoir On the Trail of the Assassins by Jim Garrison & book Crossfire: The Plot That Killed Kennedy by Jim Marrs |
| 1991 (64th) | The Prince of Tides | Pat Conroy & Becky Johnston | The novel by Conroy |
| 1992 (65th) | Howards End | Ruth Prawer Jhabvala | The novel by E. M. Forster |
| 1992 (65th) | Enchanted April | Peter Barnes | The novel by Elizabeth von Arnim |
| 1992 (65th) | The Player | Michael Tolkin | The novel by Tolkin |
| 1992 (65th) | A River Runs Through It | Richard Friedenberg | The novella by Norman Maclean |
| 1992 (65th) | Scent of a Woman | Bo Goldman | The novel Il buio e il miele by Giovanni Arpino & film by Ruggero Maccari & Dino Risi |
| 1993 (66th) | Schindler's List | Steven Zaillian | The novel Schindler's Ark by Thomas Keneally |
| 1993 (66th) | The Age of Innocence | Jay Cocks & Martin Scorsese | The novel by Edith Wharton |
| 1993 (66th) | In the Name of the Father | Terry George & Jim Sheridan | The memoir Proved Innocent: The Story of Gerry Conlon of the Guildford Four by Gerry Conlon |
| 1993 (66th) | The Remains of the Day | Ruth Prawer Jhabvala | The novel by Kazuo Ishiguro |
| 1993 (66th) | Shadowlands | William Nicholson | The play & television film by Nicholson |
| 1994 (67th) | Forrest Gump | Eric Roth | The novel by Winston Groom |
| 1994 (67th) | The Madness of King George | Alan Bennett | The play The Madness of George III by Bennett |
| 1994 (67th) | Nobody's Fool | Robert Benton | The novel by Richard Russo |
| 1994 (67th) | Quiz Show | Paul Attanasio | The book Remembering America: A Voice from the Sixties by Richard N. Goodwin |
| 1994 (67th) | The Shawshank Redemption | Frank Darabont | The novella "Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption" by Stephen King |
| 1995 (68th) | Sense and Sensibility | Emma Thompson | The novel by Jane Austen |
| 1995 (68th) | Apollo 13 | William Broyles Jr. & Al Reinert | The memoir Lost Moon: The Perilous Voyage of Apollo 13 by Jeffrey Kluger & Jim Lovell |
| 1995 (68th) | Babe | George Miller & Chris Noonan | The novel The Sheep-Pig by Dick King-Smith |
| 1995 (68th) | Leaving Las Vegas | Mike Figgis | The novel by John O'Brien |
| 1995 (68th) | Il Postino: The Postman | Screenplay: Anna Pavignano, Michael Radford, Furio & Giacomo Scarpelli & Massimo Troisi (p.n.); Story: F. & G. Scarpelli | The novel Ardiente Paciencia by Antonio Skármeta |
| 1996 (69th) | Sling Blade | Billy Bob Thornton | The short film Some Folks Call It a Sling Blade written by Thornton |
| 1996 (69th) | The Crucible | Arthur Miller | The play by Miller |
| 1996 (69th) | The English Patient | Anthony Minghella | The novel by Michael Ondaatje |
| 1996 (69th) | Hamlet | Kenneth Branagh | The play The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark by William Shakespeare |
| 1996 (69th) | Trainspotting | John Hodge | The novel by Irvine Welsh |
| 1997 (70th) | L.A. Confidential | Curtis Hanson & Brian Helgeland | The novel by James Ellroy |
| 1997 (70th) | Donnie Brasco | Paul Attanasio | The memoir Donnie Brasco: My Undercover Life in the Mafia by Joseph D. Pistone & Richard Woodley |
| 1997 (70th) | The Sweet Hereafter | Atom Egoyan | The novel by Russell Banks |
| 1997 (70th) | Wag the Dog | Hilary Henkin & David Mamet | The novel American Hero by Larry Beinhart |
| 1997 (70th) | The Wings of the Dove | Hossein Amini | The novel by Henry James |
| 1998 (71st) | Gods and Monsters | Bill Condon | The novel Father of Frankenstein by Christopher Bram |
| 1998 (71st) | Out of Sight | Scott Frank | The novel by Elmore Leonard |
| 1998 (71st) | Primary Colors | Elaine May | The novel Primary Colors: A Novel of Politics by Joe Klein |
| 1998 (71st) | A Simple Plan | Scott Smith | The novel by Smith |
| 1998 (71st) | The Thin Red Line | Terrence Malick | The novel by James Jones |
| 1999 (72nd) | The Cider House Rules | John Irving | The novel by Irving |
| 1999 (72nd) | Election | Alexander Payne & Jim Taylor | The novel by Tom Perrotta |
| 1999 (72nd) | The Green Mile | Frank Darabont | The novel by Stephen King |
| 1999 (72nd) | The Insider | Michael Mann & Eric Roth | The article "The Man Who Knew Too Much" by Marie Brenner |
| 1999 (72nd) | The Talented Mr. Ripley | Anthony Minghella | The novel by Patricia Highsmith |

### 2000s

| Year | Film | Nominees | Source Material |
| 2000 (73rd) | Traffic | Stephen Gaghan | The television series Traffik by Simon Moore |
| 2000 (73rd) | Chocolat | Robert Nelson Jacobs | The novel by Joanne Harris |
| 2000 (73rd) | Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon | Wang Hui-ling, James Schamus & Kuo Jung Tsai | The novel by Wang Dulu |
| 2000 (73rd) | O Brother, Where Art Thou? | Joel and Ethan Coen | The epic poem the Odyssey by Homer |
| 2000 (73rd) | Wonder Boys | Steve Kloves | The novel by Michael Chabon |
| 2001 (74th) | A Beautiful Mind | Akiva Goldsman | The book by Sylvia Nasar |
| 2001 (74th) | Ghost World | Daniel Clowes & Terry Zwigoff | The graphic novel by Clowes |
| 2001 (74th) | In the Bedroom | Rob Festinger & Todd Field | The short story "Killings" by Andre Dubus |
| 2001 (74th) | The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring | Philippa Boyens, Peter Jackson & Fran Walsh | The novel The Fellowship of the Ring by J. R. R. Tolkien |
| 2001 (74th) | Shrek | Ted Elliott, Roger S. H. Schulman, Joe Stillman & Terry Rossio | The picture book by William Steig |
| 2002 (75th) | The Pianist | Ronald Harwood | The memoir by Władysław Szpilman |
| 2002 (75th) | About a Boy | Peter Hedges, Chris & Paul Weitz | The novel by Nick Hornby |
| 2002 (75th) | Adaptation | Charlie & Donald Kaufman | The book The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean |
| 2002 (75th) | Chicago | Bill Condon | The musical by Fred Ebb & Bob Fosse |
| 2002 (75th) | The Hours | David Hare | The novel by Michael Cunningham |
| 2003 (76th) | The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King | Philippa Boyens, Peter Jackson & Fran Walsh | The novel The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien |
| 2003 (76th) | American Splendor | Shari Springer Berman & Robert Pulcini | The comic books by Harvey Pekar & graphic novel Our Cancer Year by Pekar & Joyce Brabner |
| 2003 (76th) | City of God | Bráulio Mantovani | The novel by Paulo Lins |
| 2003 (76th) | Mystic River | Brian Helgeland | The novel by Dennis Lehane |
| 2003 (76th) | Seabiscuit | Gary Ross | The book Seabiscuit: An American Legend by Laura Hillenbrand |
| 2004 (77th) | Sideways | Alexander Payne & Jim Taylor | The novel by Rex Pickett |
| 2004 (77th) | Before Sunset | Screenplay: Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke & Richard Linklater; Story: Kim Krizan & Linklater | Characters from the film Before Sunrise by Krizan & Linklater |
| 2004 (77th) | Finding Neverland | David Magee | The play The Man Who Was Peter Pan by Allan Knee |
| 2004 (77th) | Million Dollar Baby | Paul Haggis | The short story collection Rope Burns: Stories from the Corner by F.X. Toole |
| 2004 (77th) | The Motorcycle Diaries | José Rivera | The memoirs Traveling with Che Guevara: The Making of a Revolutionary by Alberto Granado & The Motorcycle Diaries by Che Guevara |
| 2005 (78th) | Brokeback Mountain | Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana | The short story by Annie Proulx |
| 2005 (78th) | Capote | Dan Futterman | The book by Gerald Clarke |
| 2005 (78th) | The Constant Gardener | Jeffrey Caine | The novel by John le Carré |
| 2005 (78th) | A History of Violence | Josh Olson | The graphic novel by Vince Locke & John Wagner |
| 2005 (78th) | Munich | Tony Kushner & Eric Roth | The book Vengeance by George Jonas |
| 2006 (79th) | The Departed | William Monahan | The film Infernal Affairs written by Felix Chong & Alan Mak |
| 2006 (79th) | Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan | Screenplay: Sacha Baron Cohen, Peter Baynham, Anthony Hines & Dan Mazer; Story: Baron Cohen, Baynham, Hines & Todd Phillips | The character Borat Sagdiyev from the television series Da Ali G Show by Baron Cohen |
| 2006 (79th) | Children of Men | David Arata, Alfonso Cuarón, Mark Fergus, Hawk Ostby & Timothy J. Sexton | The novel by P. D. James |
| 2006 (79th) | Little Children | Todd Field & Tom Perrotta | The novel by Perrotta |
| 2006 (79th) | Notes on a Scandal | Patrick Marber | The novel by Zoë Heller |
| 2007 (80th) | No Country for Old Men | Coen Brothers | The novel by Cormac McCarthy |
| 2007 (80th) | Atonement | Christopher Hampton | The novel by Ian McEwan |
| 2007 (80th) | Away from Her | Sarah Polley | The short story "The Bear Came Over the Mountain" by Alice Munro |
| 2007 (80th) | The Diving Bell and the Butterfly | Ronald Harwood | The memoir by Jean-Dominique Bauby |
| 2007 (80th) | There Will Be Blood | Paul Thomas Anderson | The novel Oil! by Upton Sinclair |
| 2008 (81st) | Slumdog Millionaire | Simon Beaufoy | The novel Q & A by Vikas Swarup |
| 2008 (81st) | The Curious Case of Benjamin Button | Screenplay: Eric Roth; Story: Roth & Robin Swicord | The short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald |
| 2008 (81st) | Doubt | John Patrick Shanley | The play Doubt: A Parable by Shanley |
| 2008 (81st) | Frost/Nixon | Peter Morgan | The play by Morgan |
| 2008 (81st) | The Reader | David Hare | The novel by Bernhard Schlink |
| 2009 (82nd) | Precious | Geoffrey S. Fletcher | The novel Push by Sapphire |
| 2009 (82nd) | District 9 | Neill Blomkamp & Terri Tatchell | The short film Alive in Joburg by Blomkamp |
| 2009 (82nd) | An Education | Nick Hornby | The memoir by Lynn Barber |
| 2009 (82nd) | In the Loop | Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci & Tony Roche | The character Malcolm Tucker from the television series The Thick of It by Iannucci |
| 2009 (82nd) | Up in the Air | Jason Reitman & Sheldon Turner | The novel by Walter Kirn |

### 2010s

| Year | Film | Nominees | Source Material |
| 2010 (83rd) | The Social Network | Aaron Sorkin | The book The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook, a Tale of Sex, Money, Genius, and Betrayal by Ben Mezrich |
| 2010 (83rd) | 127 Hours | Simon Beaufoy & Danny Boyle | The memoir Between a Rock and a Hard Place by Aron Ralston |
| 2010 (83rd) | Toy Story 3 | Screenplay: Michael Arndt; Story: John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton & Lee Unkrich | Characters from the film Toy Story by Pete Docter, Lasseter, Joe Ranft, & Stanton |
| 2010 (83rd) | True Grit | Coen Brothers | The novel by Charles Portis |
| 2010 (83rd) | Winter's Bone | Debra Granik & Anne Rosellini | The novel by Daniel Woodrell |
| 2011 (84th) | The Descendants | Nat Faxon, Alexander Payne & Jim Rash | The novel by Kaui Hart Hemmings |
| 2011 (84th) | Hugo | John Logan | The novel The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick |
| 2011 (84th) | The Ides of March | George Clooney, Grant Heslov & Beau Willimon | The play Farragut North by Willimon |
| 2011 (84th) | Moneyball | Screenplay: Aaron Sorkin & Steven Zaillian; Story: Stan Chervin | The book Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game by Michael Lewis |
| 2011 (84th) | Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy | Bridget O'Connor (p.n.) & Peter Straughan | The novel by John le Carré |
| 2012 (85th) | Argo | Chris Terrio | The memoir The Master of Disguise by Tony Mendez & article "The Great Escape: How the CIA Used a Fake Sci-Fi Flick to Rescue Americans from Tehran" by Joshuah Bearman |
| 2012 (85th) | Beasts of the Southern Wild | Lucy Alibar & Benh Zeitlin | The play Juicy and Delicious by Alibar |
| 2012 (85th) | Life of Pi | David Magee | The novel by Yann Martel |
| 2012 (85th) | Lincoln | Tony Kushner | The book Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin |
| 2012 (85th) | Silver Linings Playbook | David O. Russell | The novel by Matthew Quick |
| 2013 (86th) | 12 Years a Slave | John Ridley | The memoir by Solomon Northup |
| 2013 (86th) | Before Midnight | Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke & Richard Linklater | Characters from the film Before Sunrise by Kim Krizan & Linklater |
| 2013 (86th) | Captain Phillips | Billy Ray | The memoir A Captain's Duty: Somali Pirates, Navy SEALs, and Dangerous Days at Sea by Richard Phillips & Stephan Talty |
| 2013 (86th) | Philomena | Steve Coogan & Jeff Pope | The book The Lost Child of Philomena Lee by Martin Sixsmith |
| 2013 (86th) | The Wolf of Wall Street | Terence Winter | The memoir by Jordan Belfort |
| 2014 (87th) | The Imitation Game | Graham Moore | The book Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges |
| 2014 (87th) | American Sniper | Jason Hall | The memoir American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History by Jim DeFelice, Chris Kyle & Scott McEwan |
| 2014 (87th) | Inherent Vice | Paul Thomas Anderson | The novel by Thomas Pynchon |
| 2014 (87th) | The Theory of Everything | Anthony McCarten | The memoir Travelling to Infinity: My Life with Stephen by Jane Hawking |
| 2014 (87th) | Whiplash | Damien Chazelle | The short film by Chazelle |
| 2015 (88th) | The Big Short | Charles Randolph & Adam McKay | The book The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine by Michael Lewis |
| 2015 (88th) | Brooklyn | Nick Hornby | The novel by Colm Tóibín |
| 2015 (88th) | Carol | Phyllis Nagy | The novel The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith |
| 2015 (88th) | The Martian | Drew Goddard | The novel by Andy Weir |
| 2015 (88th) | Room | Emma Donoghue | The novel by Donoghue |
| 2016 (89th) | Moonlight | Screenplay: Barry Jenkins; Story: Tarell Alvin McCraney | The unpublished play In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue by McCraney |
| 2016 (89th) | Arrival | Eric Heisserer | The novella "Story of Your Life" by Ted Chiang |
| 2016 (89th) | Fences | August Wilson (p.n.) | The play by Wilson |
| 2016 (89th) | Hidden Figures | Theodore Melfi & Allison Schroeder | The book Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Who Helped Win the Space Race by Margot Lee Shetterly |
| 2016 (89th) | Lion | Luke Davies | The memoir A Long Way Home by Saroo Brierley & Larry Buttrose |
| 2017 (90th) | Call Me by Your Name | James Ivory | The novel by André Aciman |
| 2017 (90th) | The Disaster Artist | Scott Neustadter & Michael H. Weber | The memoir The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside The Room, the Greatest Bad Movie Ever Made by Greg Sestero & Tom Bissell |
| 2017 (90th) | Logan | Screenplay: Scott Frank, Michael Green & James Mangold; Story: Mangold | The character Wolverine from the comic books by John Romita Sr. & Len Wein |
| 2017 (90th) | Molly's Game | Aaron Sorkin | The memoir by Molly Bloom |
| 2017 (90th) | Mudbound | Dee Rees & Virgil Williams | The novel by Hillary Jordan |
| 2018 (91st) | BlacKkKlansman | Spike Lee, David Rabinowitz, Charlie Wachtel & Kevin Willmott | The memoir Black Klansman by Ron Stallworth |
| 2018 (91st) | The Ballad of Buster Scruggs | Coen Brothers | The short stories "All Gold Canyon" by Jack London & "The Gal Who Got Rattled" by Stewart Edward White |
| 2018 (91st) | Can You Ever Forgive Me? | Nicole Holofcener & Jeff Whitty | The memoir by Lee Israel |
| 2018 (91st) | If Beale Street Could Talk | Barry Jenkins | The novel by James Baldwin |
| 2018 (91st) | A Star Is Born | Bradley Cooper, Will Fetters & Eric Roth | The 1954 film by Moss Hart, 1976 film by Joan Didion, John Gregory Dunne & Frank Pierson & 1937 film by Robert Carson & William A. Wellman |
| 2019 (92nd) | Jojo Rabbit | Taika Waititi | The novel Caging Skies by Christine Leunens |
| 2019 (92nd) | The Irishman | Steven Zaillian | The memoir I Heard You Paint Houses: Frank "The Irishman" Sheeran and Closing the Case on Jimmy Hoffa by Charles Brandt |
| 2019 (92nd) | Joker | Todd Phillips & Scott Silver | The character from the comic books by Bill Finger, Bob Kane & Jerry Robinson |
| 2019 (92nd) | Little Women | Greta Gerwig | The novel by Louisa May Alcott |
| 2019 (92nd) | The Two Popes | Anthony McCarten | The play The Pope by McCarten |

### 2020s

| Year | Film | Nominees | Source Material |
| 2020/21 (93rd) | The Father | Christopher Hampton & Florian Zeller | The play by Zeller |
| 2020/21 (93rd) | Borat Subsequent Moviefilm | Screenplay: Sacha Baron Cohen, Peter Baynham, Jena Friedman, Anthony Hines, Lee Kern, Dan Mazer, Erica Rivinoja & Dan Swimer; Story: Baron Cohen, Hines, Nina Pedrad & Swimer | The character Borat Sagdiyev from the television series Da Ali G Show by Baron Cohen |
| 2020/21 (93rd) | Nomadland | Chloé Zhao | The book Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century by Jessica Bruder |
| 2020/21 (93rd) | One Night in Miami... | Kemp Powers | The play by Powers |
| 2020/21 (93rd) | The White Tiger | Ramin Bahrani | The novel by Arvind Adiga |
| 2021 (94th) | CODA | Sian Heder | The film La Famille Bélier by Victoria Bedos, Thomas Bidegain, Stanislas Carré de Malberg & Éric Lartigau |
| 2021 (94th) | Drive My Car | Ryusuke Hamaguchi & Takamasa Oe | The short story by Haruki Murakami |
| 2021 (94th) | Dune | Eric Roth, Jon Spaihts & Denis Villeneuve | The novel by Frank Herbert |
| 2021 (94th) | The Lost Daughter | Maggie Gyllenhaal | The novel by Elena Ferrante |
| 2021 (94th) | The Power of the Dog | Jane Campion | The novel by Thomas Savage |
| 2022 (95th) | Women Talking | Sarah Polley | The novel by Miriam Toews |
| 2022 (95th) | All Quiet on the Western Front | Edward Berger, Lesley Paterson & Ian Stokell | The novel by Erich Maria Remarque |
| 2022 (95th) | Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery | Rian Johnson | The character Benoit Blanc from the film Knives Out by Johnson |
| 2022 (95th) | Living | Kazuo Ishiguro | The film Ikiru by Shinobu Hashimoto, Akira Kurosawa & Hideo Oguni |
| 2022 (95th) | Top Gun: Maverick | Screenplay: Ehren Kruger, Christopher McQuarrie & Eric Warren Singer; Story: Peter Craig & Justin Marks | Characters from the film Top Gun by Jim Cash & Jack Epps Jr. |
| 2023 (96th) | American Fiction | Cord Jefferson | The novel Erasure by Percival Everett |
| 2023 (96th) | Barbie | Noah Baumbach & Greta Gerwig | The characters created by Ruth Handler |
| 2023 (96th) | Oppenheimer | Christopher Nolan | The book American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird & Martin J. Sherwin |
| 2023 (96th) | Poor Things | Tony McNamara | The novel Poor Things: Episodes from the Early Life of Archibald McCandless M.D., Scottish Public Health Officer by Alisdair Gray |
| 2023 (96th) | The Zone of Interest | Jonathan Glazer | The novel by Martin Amis |
| 2024 (97th) | Conclave | Peter Straughan | The novel by Robert Harris |
| 2024 (97th) | A Complete Unknown | Jay Cocks & James Mangold | The book Dylan Goes Electric! Newport, Seeger, Dylan, and the Night That Split the Sixties by Elijah Wald |
| 2024 (97th) | Emilia Pérez | Jacques Audiard, Thomas Bidegain, Nicolas Livecchi & Léa Mysius | The novel Écoute by Boris Razon & the opera libretto by Audiard |
| 2024 (97th) | Nickel Boys | Joslyn Barnes & RaMell Ross | The novel The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead |
| 2024 (97th) | Sing Sing | Screenplay: Clint Bentley & Greg Kwedar; Story: Bentley, Kwedar, Clarence Maclin & John "Divine G" Whitfield | The book The Sing Sing Follies by John H. Richardson & the play Breakin' the Mummy's Code by Brent Buell |

## Age superlatives

| Record | Writer | Film | Age |
| Oldest winner | James Ivory | Call Me by Your Name | 89 years, 270 days |
| Oldest nominee | James Ivory | Call Me by Your Name | 89 years, 230 days |
| Youngest winner | Charlie Wachtel | BlacKkKlansman | *32 years |
| Youngest nominee | Joseph L. Mankiewicz | Skippy | 22 years, 236 days |