Oscars 2023: A quick recap of the night of records and emotional speeches

Washington [US], March 13 (ANI): The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences pulled off a largely controversy-free ceremony that seemed to keep everything on track, or at least didn’t go off the rails, reported the New York Times. The 95th Academy Awards holds special importance for all Indians as the nation bagged two trophies on the global stage. Apart from these, the stage witnessed several emotional moments.

Here are some of the highs and lows from the show, as reported by the Hollywood Reporter.

A24’s Everything Everywhere All at Once won best picture at the 2023 Oscars on Sunday night, and won seven trophies including prizes for its direction, original screenplay, editing and performances from actors Michelle Yeoh, Ke Huy Quan and Jamie Lee Curtis.

The film’s star Michelle Yeoh won the Oscar for best actress, becoming the first Asian woman and only second woman of colour after Halle Berry — who won for Monster’s Ball in 2002 and presented the award to Yeoh with last year’s winner Jessica Chastain.

“Thank you all the little boys and girls look like me watching tonight,” said Yeoh. “This is a beacon of hope and possibilities. This is proof that dreams to come true. And ladies, don’t let anybody tell you [that] you are ever passed your prime.”

Brendan Fraser won best actor for another A24 film, The Whale. His performance in the film has been considered a comeback for the actor who — as host Jimmy Kimmel noted in his opening monologue — once appeared in Encino Man alongside fellow Oscar winner Ke Huy Quan. “I started in this business 30 years ago,” said Fraser in his acceptance speech. “Things didn’t come easily to me, but there was a facility that I didn’t appreciate at the time until it stopped,”

Ke Huy Quan won the Oscar for best supporting actor for his role in Everything Everywhere, delivering an emotional speech to a standing ovation from the audience. “Mom, I just won an Oscar!” he said, noting that his road to the Oscars was long and unexpected. “My journey started on a boat,” said Quan, who fled Vietnam with his parents in 1978. “I spent a year in a refugee camp, and somehow, I ended up here on Hollywood’s biggest stage. Stories like this only happen in the movies.”

Quan’s co-star Jamie Lee Curtis took the Oscar for best supporting actress for the A24 film. “I know it looks like I’m standing up here by myself, but I am not — I am hundreds of people,” said Curtis, who noted that her parents Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh were both nominated for Oscars, but neither won.

filmmaking duo Daniels (Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert) took both best director(s) and best original screenplay for Everything Everywhere All at Once, becoming just the third two-person directing team to take the Oscar for direction after West Side Story’s Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins and the Coen brothers for No Country for Old Men.

Netflix’s All Quiet on the Western Front won best international film, the third win for Germany. All Quiet also scored prizes for original score, production design and cinematography. It was the eighth film to be nominated for this category and best picture in the same year (and the first German-language film to earn a best picture nomination).

Guillermo del Toro earned his third Oscar for Netflix’s Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio, which earned the award for best-animated feature. “Animation is ready to be taken to the next step,” said del Toro in his acceptance speech. “Please help us, and keep the animation in the conversation.”

Performances

Performances of the tunes nominated for the best original song included 14-time nominee Diane Warren making her debut on the Oscars stage, accompanying singer-actress Sofia Carson on piano for “Applause” from Tell It Like a Woman.

Lady Gaga — who originally was not slated to perform before being added to the lineup at the last minute — delivered a stripped-down rendition of Top Gun: Maverick’s ballad “Hold My Hand.”

Rihanna performed “Lift Me Up” from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, which she wrote with the film’s composer Ludwig Goransson, director Ryan Coogler and Nigerian singer-songwriter Tems.

And Oscar winner David Byrne was joined by Everything Everywhere star (and nominee) Stephanie Hsu to perform “This Is a Life” from the A24 film.

But it was RRR’s “Naatu Naatu” that won the Oscar for best original song, with composer M. M. Keeravani delivering his acceptance in the form of a parody of the Carpenters’ “Top of the World”.

Ruth E. Carter won her second Oscar for best costume design for Disney/Marvel’s Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, following her first win in 2019 for the previous film in the Marvel franchise. Carter dedicated her historic win, as the first Black woman to win two awards in any category, to her late mother, who passed away last week: “This [movie] prepared me for this moment,” Carter said, also honouring Black Panther star Chadwick Boseman. “Chadwick, please take care of Mom.”

Best documentary feature went to Navalny, and director Daniel Roher dedicated the prize to Russian political opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

The directors of An Irish Goodbye, winner of the Oscar for best live-action short film, used their time at the mic to ask the audience to sing “Happy Birthday” to star James Martin.

Host Jimmy Kimmel returned to the Dolby Theatre for his third Academy Awards hosting gig, using his opening monologue to applaud the films that brought moviegoers back to cinemas. “The films you worked so hard to make the way they were supposed to be seen: in the theatre,” Kimmel noted before turning his attention to Oscar winner Nicole Kidman in the audience: “I’m glad to see that Nicole Kidman has finally been released from that abandoned AMC,” he joked.

“It was such a great year for diversity and inclusion, including nominees from all corners of Dublin,” mused Kimmel, pointing out that five Irish performers were among the nominated actors.

But he also noted two films not nominated for Oscars: Sony’s The Woman King and MGM/United Artists’ Till, which were both controversially shut out by the Academy despite critical praise for Gina Prince-Bythewood’s historical epic and Chinonye Chukwu’s drama led by Danielle Deadwyler.

Kimmel also saved the elephant in the room, Will Smith slapping Chris Rock during last year’s Oscars, for the end of his monologue: “We want you to have fun, we want you to feel safe; and most importantly, I want to feel safe,” he said. “If anyone commits an act of violence, you will be rewarded with the Oscar for best actor.” (ANI)