After her Oscar win, Tomei appeared as silent film star Mabel Normand in the film "Chaplin", with her then-boyfriend Robert Downey Jr. playing Charlie Chaplin. The following year, she starred in the romantic drama "Untamed Heart" with Christian Slater, for which they won the MTV Movie Award for Best Kiss. Tomei had won the previous year for Best Breakthrough Performance for "My Cousin Vinny". The next year, Tomei appeared alongside Downey again in the romantic comedy "Only You". She then appeared in Nick Cassavetes' "Unhook the Stars". Of Tomei's performance, Stephen Holden of "The New York Times" compared her favorably to the film's star, Gena Rowlands, writing, "Ms. Tomei is equally fine as Mildred's character younger, hot-tempered neighbor, whose raw working-class feistiness and bluntly profane vocabulary initially repel the genteel older woman." She received her first Screen Actors Guild award nomination for Outstanding Female Supporting Actor for her performance. In 1998, she was nominated for the American Comedy Award for Funniest Supporting Actress for Tamara Jenkins' cult film "Slums of Beverly Hills". The independent feature was well received by critics and the public, with Janet Maslin of "The New York Times" writing, "Jenkins makes the most of an especially ingratiating cast, with Ms. Tomei very charming and funny as Rita," and Emanuel Levy of "Variety" describing Tomei as "spunky and sexy... more subdued than she usually is." Tomei spent several years away from high-profile roles and major motion pictures in the late 1990s before rising again to prominence in the early 2000s.