At the 91st Academy Awards, the competition for Best Actress was steep. The nominees included Lady Gaga, who shined in the crowd-pleaser A Star Is Born; Yalitza Aparicio, a former schoolteacher plucked from obscurity to star in Roma, her first acting role; Melissa McCarthy, an actress known for comedy, who showed impressive dramatic chops in Can You Ever Forgive Me?; Olivia Colman, who played an eccentric, lustful Queen Anne in The Favourite; and Glenn Close, a Hollywood icon who delivered a powerful performance in The Wife and has been nominated for an Oscar six times, but never won.
Critics predicted that Close would win Best Actress, but in a surprising turn of events, she lost for the seventh time. Instead, the award went to Colman. The 45-year-old is well-known to British audiences for her roles in comedies like Peep Show, Broadchurch and Hot Fuzz. However, she got her breakout role in The Favourite, playing a horny monarch who gets caught in a love triangle with with an impoverished Machiavellian maid (Emma Stone) and her bullish, ball-busting adviser, the Duchess of Marlborough (Rachel Weisz).
American viewers who hadn't seen The Favourite probably didn't recognize Colman. However, she won the internet's heart with an incredible acceptance speech that went viral. It was hilarious, emotional and off-the-cuff; easily one of the best moments of the night. She paid tribute to her idol Glenn Close, made a raspberry when the powers that be told her to wrap it up, and signed off by blowing a kiss to Lady Gaga.
“It’s genuinely quite stressful," Colman began. "This is hilarious. I got an Oscar! Okay, I have to thank lots of people. If, by the way, I forget anybody, I’m going to find you later and give you all a massive snog. Yorgos - my best director and the best film and with Emma and Rachel, the two loveliest women in the world to fall in love with and to go to work with every day. You can imagine this wasn’t a hardship. And to be in this category with these extraordinary women and Glenn Close – you’ve been my idol for so long and this is not how I wanted it to be and I think you’re amazing and I love you very much. I love you all. Thank you...
She continued, "Lindy King – my agent – who took me on over 20 years ago, thank you so much, and Olive and Hildy and Brynna, who made me do things I said no to, but she was right. And my mum and my dad – well, you know. My kids, who are at home and watching. Well, if you’re not, then kind of well done but I sort of hope you are; this is not going to happen again. And any little girl who’s practicing her speech on the telly, you never know. I used to work as a cleaner and I loved that job but I did spend quite a lot of my time imagining this. Oh, please wrap up...
After blowing a raspberry at the prompt to wrap it up, she concluded: "My husband, Ed, my best friend, I love you so much. 25 years and you’ve been my best supporter. He’s gonna cry! I’m not. Thank you so much – Fox, everybody, the cast and crew. Thank you. Argh, thank you so much. Lady Gaga! And Melissa! Thank you."
Colman can next be seen in seasons three and four of The Crown, where she'll take over the role of Queen Elizabeth II. No word on if there will be any steamy love triangles.
