The 96th Oscars has just taken place, with several winners making inspiring, uplifting speeches. We look at the winners of the major categories and what they said.
Emma Stone
Best Actress for Poor Things
Emma Stone took home her second Oscar for her role as Bella Baxter in Poor Things. She won her first Oscar for Best Actress in La La Land in 2017.
She dedicated the award “to every cast member, with every crew member, with every single person who poured their love and their care and their brilliance into the making of this film with Yorgos [Lanthimoso.]”
“Thank you for the gift of a lifetime in Bella Baxter. I am forever thankful for you. Thank you for inviting all of us to be members of this queue. Thank you. We, I just, oh, I know I have to wrap up but I really just want to thank my family, my mum, my brother Spencer, my dad, my husband Dave.”
“I love you so much. And most importantly, my daughter who’s gonna be three in three days and has turned our lives technicolor. I love you bigger than the whole sky, my girl. So thank you so much.”
Poor Things took home three other awards, including Best Makeup and Hairstyling (Nadia Stacey, Mark Coulier and Josh Weston), Production Design (Shona Heath, James Price, Szusza Mihalek) Costume Design (Holly Waddington).
Da’vine Joy Randolph
Best Supporting Actress
Randolph, 37, won for her role as Mary Lamb in Alexander Payne’s The Holdovers. According to the host, Jimmy Kimmel, Randolph had to practice how to smoke for her role. In her acceptance speech, Randolph thanked her mother for encouraging her to pursuit acting.
“God is so good. God is so good. You know, I I didn’t think I was supposed to be doing this as a career. I started off as a singer and my mother said to me, go across that street to that theatre department. There’s something for you there. And I thank my mother for doing that.”
“I thank you to all the people who have stepped in my path and has been there for me who has ushered me and guided me. I am so grateful to all you beautiful people out here for, for so long. I’ve always wanted to be different and now I realise I just need to be myself.”
“I thank you when I was the only black girl in that class, when you saw me and you told me I was enough. And when I told you I don’t see myself. You said that’s fine. We’re gonna forge our own path. You’re gonna lay a trail for yourself. I am so grateful to all the women who have been by my side. I have to give a special shout out to my publicist.”
“And I know y’all said, don’t say nothing about no publicist, but you don’t have a publicist like I have a publicist. She’s been by my side of the entire thing and I am forever grateful. I pray to God that I get to do this more than once. I thank you for seeing me.”
Justine Triet and Arthur Harari
Best Original Screenplay
French director and writer Justine Triet won Best Original Screenplay for her movie Anatomy of a Fall, sharing the award with her partner, Arthur Harari. According to IMDB, Triet is only the thirteenth woman in Oscars history to win the award.
“Thank you so much,” Triet said. “This [award] will help me through my mid-life crisis. This is a crazy year. This glamour tonight contrasts with [how we] started [this movie]…before. We were stuck in a house with two kids. It was lockdown. There was no line between work and diapers.”
“I want to thank all the cast for what you did on set, you killed the script on set. That’s the best for writers and directors.”
Jennifer Lame
Best Editing
According to a 2023 USC Annenberg study, 14 per cent of best editing nominees across Oscar history have been women. Very few of them have won the award. This year, Jennifer Lame took home the prize for Oppenheimer, using her speech to thank her producer.
“Emma Thomson – you are amazing, you are a bad ass producer and you make these complicated, beautiful films, and your are unflappable and I am in awe of you. Chris Nolan, you’re okay too. I was terrified when I was first hired by you, it felt like you took a huge risk on me, you never made me feel that way. You instill so much confidence in me and I looked forward to going to work with you everyday. It’s so exciting to collaborate with you.”
Billie Eilish
Best Original Song
Billie Eilish and her brother Finneas O’Connell became the Oscars’ youngest ever two-time winners, taking home the award for Best Original Song “What was I made for?” from the movie, Barbie, which they performed live during the ceremony.
Eilish, 22 and her brother, 26, previously won for “No Time to Die,” the main song for the 2022 James Bond film.
In her acceptance speech, Elish dedicated the award to “everyone who was affected by the movie and how incredible it is.”
“I want to thank my team and my parents, I love you guys so much,” she said. “ Thank you to Margo, of course, to Lucky chap, Tom.”
“Thank you to our parents forever and ever and ever. Thank you to Claudia for listening to my best friend Zoe for playing Barbies with me growing up and being by my side forever. I want to thank my like dance teachers growing up. I want to thank my choir teachers, Miss Brigham. Thanks for believing in me.”
Cillian Murphy
Best Actor
Cillian Murphy won Best Actor for his role in Oppenheimer, dedicating his award to “the peacemakers.”
“Thank you to the Academy. Chris Nolan and Emma Thomas. It’s been the wildest, most exhilarating, most creatively satisfying journey you’ve taken me on over the last 20 years. I owe you more than I can say.”
“Thank you so much every single crew member, every single cast member on Oppenheimer. You guys carried me through all my fellow nominees. I remain in awe of you guys truly, and I want to thank my incredible team. I’m a very proud Irish man standing here tonight. So, you know, we made a film.”
“We made a film about the man who created the atomic bomb, and for better or for worse, we’re all living in Oppenheimer’s world, so I would really like to dedicate this to the peacemakers everywhere.”
Christopher Nolan
Best Director
It was a first Oscars win for eight-time nominee, Christopher Nolan, for Best Director forOppenheimer. In his acceptable speech, he thanked the studios that helped him create the film, and “for seeing the potential in this.”
“I have so many people to thank the most incredible cast — Matt, Damon, Robert, Emily, Florence and so many others all at the top of their game, led by the incredible Cillian Murphy, and a crew, some of whom have been rewarded tonight.”
“I can’t say enough about the incredible crew that we got together on this film. And thank you for those who’ve been there for me and believed in me my whole career. To the academy, just to say, movies are just a little bit over 100 years old. I mean, imagine being there 100 years into painting or theatre. We don’t know where this incredible journey is going from here.”
“But to know that you think that I’m a meaningful part of it means the world to me. Thank you very much.”
And….Best Picture went to Oppenheimer, who was the predicted winner for the award on Sunday night.