Humility, humour and thanking mothers

Speeches from the winners at the 87th Academy Awards.

Best Film

Sean Penn announced that the top award went to Birdman.

Speaking backstage later in the press room, director Alejandro G Iñárritu said of being Mexican: “Well, look at this room. I don’t know how many nationalities are in this room, but I don’t feel different to anybody of you here. 

“You know, it can be from any continent, from any language. I don’t care. I as an artist, as a human, as a filmmaker, I cannot have these stupid borders, flags, and passports. Those are a concept that were invented by a human society. 

“But, honestly, naked, in tighty whities we will be the same. And I have never felt that different. So for me to make films in the United States, or in Africa, or in Spain, or in Mexico, I’m talking about human beings and emotions. And I think that’s the beauty of art. 

“Art doesn’t have those stiff ideological borders that fuck the world so much.”

Best Cinematography

Emmanuel Lubezki, who won the same award for Gravity last year, collected this year’s Oscar for Birdman.

He said: “Wow. This is extraordinary. Thank you so much. I want to thank the Academy for this fantastic honour and I would like to share it with the cast and crew of the movie and all the nominees.

“I want to especially share this with my friend Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu, an extraordinary director. To your curiosity, your passion and your friendship.

“I want to share this also with my wife, Lauren, and with Ale and Dani, with my parents and my family. And thank you so much.”

Best Original Screenplay

Birdman director Alejandro G Inarritu thanked his fellow scriptwriters Nicolas Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, Jr and Armando Bo as he picked up the award for best original screenplay.

“Wow. The journey of Birdman start three years ago when I ask Nico, Armando and Alexander to follow me in a crazy idea,” said the director. “And because they are crazy, they did it and we wrote together Birdman. And for that I am all my life grateful and thankful for that, to share this experience with them.

“We want to thank our incredible cast: Emma, Naomi, Andrea, Amy, Lindsay, Mr. Norton, Zach and the maestro of maestros, Mr. Michael Keaton, wolf, for making this film fly. Without you guys, we would not be here. James Skotchdopole, John Lesher, the producers.

“And I want to thank too, obviously, the great support from Arnon Milchan, Brad Weston from New Regency and all the team of Fox Searchlight, Nancy Utley… Claudia Lewis and Steve Gilula and all the people who helped us.

“Really, thank you very much for all the audience to see this crazy film. My kids Eliseo, Maria Eladia, my wife, Maria Eladia.”

Best Lead Actor

Eddie Redmayne triumphed for his performance as Stephen Hawking in The Theory Of Everything.

“Oh, my God. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you to the Academy. I don’t think I’m capable of articulating quite how I feel right now. Please know this, I am fully aware that I am a lucky, lucky man. This Oscar — wow! — this Oscar, this belongs to all of those people around the world battling ALS.

“It belongs to one exceptional family: Stephen, Jane, Jonathan and the Hawking children. And I will be its custodian and I will promise you I will look after him. I will polish him. I will answer his beck and call. I will wait on him hand and foot.

“But I would not be here were it not for an extraordinary troupe of people. My staggering partner in crime, Felicity Jones. My ferocious and yet incredibly kind director, James Marsh. Working Title, Focus, Lisa and Anthony, Nina and my ingenious team of Dallas, Josh, Gene, Jason, Elan, Carl, Britney and Carrie and Pip.

“Now, finally, please, this is so extraordinary. I just want to thank my family and you, Hannah, my wife. I love you so much. We have a new fellow coming to share our apartment. Thank you.”

Best Supporting Actor

Whiplash star JK Simmons picked up the first Oscar of the night.

“Wow, thank you. Thank you to the Academy. Thank you to everyone involved in the making of Whiplash,” said the actor.

“And I am grateful everyday for the most remarkable person I know: my wife, the wonderful Michelle Schumacher. I’m grateful for your love, your kindness, your wisdom, your sacrifice and your patience.

“Which brings me to the above-average children – even though I may try their patience more. Joe and Olivia, you are extraordinary human beings. Smart, funny, kind, loving people and that’s because you are a reflection of your mother.

“And if I may, call your mom, everybody. I’ve told this [to], like, a billion people, or so. Call your mom. Call your dad. If you’re lucky enough to have a parent or two alive on this planet, call ‘em. Don’t text. Don’t email. Call them on the phone. Tell ‘em you love ‘em, and thank them, and listen to them for as long as they want to talk to you.

“Thank you. Thank you, Mom and Dad.”

Best Editing

A fortnight after picking up the BAFTA, Whiplash editor Tom Cross said: “Wow. I want to thank the Academy for honoring Whiplash with this award. I couldn’t have done this without the contribution of the entire cast and crew of Whiplash. Blumhouse, Bold Films, Right Of Way Films, our amazing team at Sony Pictures Classics, Michael Barker and Tom Bernard. And our team at WME. Also, my assistant editors, John To and Eugene Lok, I couldn’t have done it without you guys.

“Miles Teller and J K Simmons, I need to thank you for delivering gold to the cutting room everyday. And most of all, I need to thank the person who never once threw a chair at my head but always pushed to make it better, the writer and director Damien Chazelle.

“Damien, I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for sharing this journey with me. I will forever be indebted to you. Your art changed my life. And to my beautiful wife, Holly and my children Nova and Peri, you are my life.”

Best Sound Mixing

Collecting the award for Whiplash, Craig Mann (shared with Ben Wilkins and Thomas Curley), said: “Thank you, Academy, for this honour. We’re thrilled to be here. Damien Chazelle, I don’t quite know where you are. There he is.

“Under extremely difficult conditions, you showed us the meaning of leadership and under that leadership, a creative collaboration blossomed. And that creativity is really what helps us do our job. So, thank you.

“David Lancaster, Helen Estabrook, Jason Blum, Couper Samuelson, everybody at Blumhouse, thank you. It’s pretty big up here.”

Best Supporting Actress

Winning her Oscar for Boyhood, Patricia Arquette said: “Okay, Jesus. Thank you to the Academy, to my beautiful, powerful nominees. To IFC, Jonathan Sehring, John Sloss, Cathleen Sutherland, Molly Madden, David DeCamillo, our whole cast and our crew.

“My Boyhood family, who I love and admire. Our brilliant director Richard Linklater. The impeccable Ethan Hawke. My lovelies, Ellar Coltrane, Lorelei Linklater. Thomas and Paul, thank you for giving me my beautiful children. Enzo and Harlow, you’re the deepest people that I know.

“My friends who all work so hard to make this world a better place. To my parents, Rosanna, Richmond, Alexis and David. To my favorite painter in the world, Eric White, for the inspiration of living with a genius.

“To my heroes, volunteers and experts who have helped me bring ecological sanitation to the developing world with GiveLove.org.

“To every woman who gave birth, to every taxpayer and citizen of this nation, we have fought for everybody else’s equal rights. It’s our time to have wage equality once and for all and equal rights for women in the United States of America.”

Best Adapted Screenplay

Collecting his award for The Imitation Game from Oprah Winfrey, Graham Moore said: “Thank you so much to the Academy and to Oprah for this.

“I need to shower my love and kisses on everyone who’s a part of our Imitation Game family. Morten, Nora, Ido, Teddy, Keira, Benedict, Billy, Alexandre, our entire cast, Maria, who’s back there somewhere. I love you guys so much. Thank you for this film. I’m so indebted to you for it.

“So, here’s the thing: Alan Turing never got to stand on a stage like this and look out at all of these disconcertingly attractive faces and I do. And that’s the most unfair thing I think I’ve ever heard.

“So, in this brief time here, what I want to use it to do is to say this: When I was 16 years old, I tried to kill myself because I felt weird and I felt different and I felt like I did not belong.

“And now I’m standing here and, so, I would like for this moment to be for that kid out there who feels like she’s weird or she’s different or she doesn’t fit in anywhere. Yes, you do. I promise you do. You do.

“Stay weird. Stay different. And then when it’s your turn and you are standing on this stage, please pass the same message to the next person who comes along. Thank you so much.” 

Best Documentary

Picking up the prize for Citizenfour, director Laura Poitras said: “Thank you so much to the Academy. I’d like to first thank the documentary community. It’s an incredible joy to work among people who support each other so deeply and do such incredible work. We don’t stand here alone. The work we do… that needs to be seen by the public is possible through the brave organisations that support us.

“We’d like to thank RADiUS, Participant, HBO, BRITDOC and the many, many, many organsations who had our back making this film.

“The disclosures that Edward Snowden reveals don’t only expose the threat to our privacy but to our democracy itself. And the most important decisions being made affecting all of us are made in secret. We lose our ability to check the powers that control.

“Thank you to Edward Snowden for his courage and for the many other whistleblowers. And I share this with Glenn Greenwald and other journalists who are exposing truth. Thank you.”

Best Foreign-Language Film

Ida director Pawel Pawlikowski was the first person on the night to have his speech interrupted by the ‘wind-up’ music. But unwilling the move, the music was played twice.

In his speech, he said: “Aw, God. How did I get here? We made a film about - as you saw, black and white - about the need for silence and withdrawal from the world and contemplation. And here we are at this epicentre of noise and world attention. Fantastic. You know, life is full of surprises.

“So, I’d like to thank the Academy. I’m honoured, surprised and overwhelmed. I’d like to thank the people who backed our film: the producers, Eric Abraham of Portobello, Piotr Dzieciol, Agnieszka Odorowicz of the Polish Film Institute and many others. They backed - oh, and our US distributor who did a great job for very little money.

“Oh, wrap up. Good, okay, so quickly… to my Polish friends who are in front of the TV. The crew who were in the trenches with us and who are totally drunk now. And you are fantastic, you are brilliant. You carried me through this film, and you are what I love about Poland: resilient, courageous, brave and funny. And you can take a drink.

“And Ida, I would like to dedicate it to my late wife, my parents, who are not among the living, but who are totally inside this film and they have a lot to do with the film. And my children, who are hopefully watching, who are still alive. Thank you, thank you. Victor and Maria, Victor and Maria, I love you. You are the main prize. Thank you.”

Best Costume Designer

Milena Canonero’s collected her fourth Oscar for her work on The Grand Budapest Hotel.

She said: “Thank you, all of you. Thank you very much, members of the Academy. And thank you, Wes. This is - this is you. This I should share with you.

“You’ve been a great inspiration. You are like a conductor. You are like a composer. You are like - you are our director and you inspire us, all of us that have been nominated here. If it wasn’t for you, this movie, you know, I couldn’t have done it this way. And thank you very much, Wes. Thank you for Life Aquatic. Thank you for Darjeeling Limited. Thank you for this one.

“And thank you, all of you. Thank you.”

Best Original Song

Common and John Stephens won best original song for Glory from Selma.

Common said: “First, I would like to thank God, who lives in us all. Recently, John and I got to go to Selma and perform Glory on the same bridge that Dr. King and the people of the civil rights movement marched on 50 years ago. This bridge was once a landmark of a divided nation but now is a symbol for change.

“The spirit of this bridge transcends race, gender, religion, sexual orientation and social status. The spirit of this bridge connects the kid from the south side of Chicago dreaming of a better life to those in France standing up for their freedom of expression, to the people in Hong Kong protesting for democracy. This bridge was built on hope, welded with compassion and elevated by love for all human beings.

John Legend: “Thank you. Nina Simone said it’s an artist’s duty to reflect the times in which we live. We wrote this song for a film that was based on events that were 50 years ago but we say that Selma is now because the struggle for justice is right now. We know that the Voting Rights Act that they fought for 50 years ago is being compromised right now in this country today.

“We know that right now the struggle for freedom and justice is real. We live in the most incarcerated country in the world. There are more black men under correctional control today than were under slavery in 1850. When people are marching with our song, we want to tell you we are with you, we see you, we love you, and march on. God bless you.”

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