Actress Meryl Streep has described the Oscars as nothing more than a "political campaign".

Streep - who won the best supporting actress Golden Globe for Adaptation - said she found the race for Academy Award success "distasteful", despite being in the running herself.

Streep, 53, has a best supporting actress nomination for director Spike Jonze's Adaptation.

"I find it alarming that all the campaigning for Oscars is getting like a political campaign," she told the Daily Telegraph newspaper in the UK.

"It really is distasteful."

"That part of the business is horseracing, the other is acting, and that's my interest," she added.

"It won't be long before they start paying for television commercials for best picture, best actor and all those things."

Meryl Streep won a supporting actress Golden Globe for Adaptation

In The Hours Streep plays a woman planning a party for her ex-lover who is dying from Aids while Adaptation sees her star as real-life author Susan Orleans.

Streep has been nominated for an Oscar 12 times and has won twice before - for Kramer vs Kramer and Sophie's Choice.

She shares the record for nominations with Katharine Hepburn.

Clerical error

Last week, however, Streep missed out on two nominations for the Screen Actors Guild awards because of a clerical error at the Columbia Pictures studio.

Her publicist told USA Today newspaper the omission was because Streep's name was put forward for best actress for Adaptation instead of the supporting category.

As a result she ended up competing against herself in The Hours, a role for which she was put forward as best actress, and lost out on votes for either role.