The 27th annual Critics Choice Awards returned to an in-person ceremony Sunday, with Netflix’s The Power of the Dog taking home top prizes for best picture and best director for Jane Campion. Will Smith, Jessica Chastain, Troy Kotsur and Ariana DeBose were among the other big winners in the film categories. Television stars Jason Sudeikis, Jean Smart, Kieran Culkin, Jennifer Coolidge, Murray Bartlett, Melanie Lynskey and Lee Jung-jae also won awards.
Nailed It! host and Grand Crew star Nicole Byer was joined by All American‘s Taye Diggs to emcee the event, simulcast on The CW and TBS.
Originally planned to take place Jan. 9, the show was rescheduled due the omicron variant surge in the United States. To accommodate nominees who also attended Sunday’s BAFTA film awards ceremony in London (which was held earlier at the Royal Albert Hall), the Critics Choice Awards took place at both Los Angeles’ Fairmont Century Plaza Hotel and London’s Savoy Hotel.
CODA‘s Kotsur, who attended the London event and earlier earned a BAFTA Award for his role, picked up his first Critics Choice win for best supporting actor. West Side Story‘s DeBose, who also took home a BAFTA Award, won for best supporting actress and thanked the critics for embracing Steven Spielberg’s remake of the 1961 movie musical. She then offered an inspiring message for “all the young people” watching at home: “It doesn’t matter how you identify who you are, you are unique, you are talented, you are seeing your value, you are loved and you matter. Please don’t ever forget that.”
Minari‘s Alan Kim, who charmed audiences last year when he won best young actor and tearfully accepted his award during the virtual ceremony, walked on stage Sunday to great applause from the audience. “Wow, it’s crazy to look at a video of a younger me,” joked the 9-year-old. “I’ve gotta tell ya, growing up in this business is no picnic.” Kim presented the best young actor award to Belfast‘s breakout star Jude Hill.
Belfast also won the best ensemble award, which star Jamie Dornan accepted on his cast-mates’ behalf. “Critics are usually not very nice to me,” Dornan said of his surprise that the film won.
Following Maria Bakalova, who showed her support for Ukraine ahead of presenting the best supporting actor award, Dornan also vocalized his support for the country and drew parallels to Belfast. “I cannot emphasize enough the importance of telling a story about a place that people don’t really have a vague idea about, and telling you about the real people from that place not seen through a politicized or paramilitary lens, which is often the case in Belfast, [but] seeing it through the eyes of family, something we can all relate to. We need to relate to the people and the families through [this] hardship.”
Last year’s best actress winner Carey Mulligan returned to present the award for best actor. “In recognizing the incredible, complex and staggering performances by our best actor nominees tonight, we for the most part, continue an age-old Hollywood tradition of rewarding men for acting like complete and utter bastards,” she quipped. “I can tell you that, however, having auditioned over the years to play nearly all of their wives and girlfriends — and incidentally, Andrew Garfield’s mother once — they’re all truly, actually very lovely people and fairly normal, which makes their performances this year even more impressive.”
Smith won the award for his role in King Richard, and noted that Venus and Serena Williams had joined him, alongside their sister Isha Price. “Thank you for entrusting me with your story,” Smith said to the sisters. “What you were able to do, and what your family was able to do, inspired everyone in this room, everyone in this country and everyone around the world. You all define the American dream.”
“I’ve played real life characters a couple times,” Smith told members of the press following his win. “It holds an extra burden because when I play someone everyone is going to assume that that’s the real story and that’s how it was. There’s an awful couple of weeks when the movie’s finished and you know the family is going to start to see it. There’s an emotional release when people feel honored when you tell a true story.”
Succession’s Culkin, who won best supporting actor in a drama series, admitted he did not have a speech prepared, using his time at the mic to call out colleagues Sarah Snook and J. Smith Cameron, in order, as his favorite performers to work with. His costar Snook also won the award for best supporting actress in a drama series. (Culkin revealed to members of the press following Succession‘s win for best drama series that Snook was unable to attend because she tested positive for COVID-19.)
Insecure’s Issa Rae was on hand to present the SeeHer Award to Halle Berry. “SeeHer and its partners are committed to creating content free of gender bias,” Rae said. “This award goes to women who embody the movement and inspire all women and girls to see themselves and all the possibilities because we cannot underestimate the power of what it feels like to be seen in the content you consume.”
Upon accepting the award, Berry recalled first reading the script for Bruised, which marked her directorial debut last year: “I realized that it wasn’t written for someone that looked like me. So I went to the producers and I said, ‘Why not me? Why can’t it be a Black woman?’ They said, ‘Why not?’ Later on, they told me, ‘Now, go find a director.’ And then finally, I summoned the courage to say, ‘Why not me?’
“I’ve been in the business for 30 years, and I used to think that if I could play the part of a white man, that I was winning,” Berry continued. “But you know what? I want to know why that didn’t work. Because if you didn’t know, I’m not a white man. For those roles to work, they would have to be substantially changed. It would have to be written with the reality of my journey, in all of its beauty and all of its pain. This is why I am so grateful to be standing and living in this moment where women are standing up and we are telling our own stories.”
Smart won best actress in a comedy series (Hacks), and announced she was throwing out her acceptance speech to congratulate co-showrunners and creators Lucia Aniello and Paul W. Downs, who welcomed their first child together over the weekend. Smart noted that Aniello was receiving video feed from the Hacks set on Friday while in labor, “directing in between contractions” before giving birth to their son — and on Saturday, also earning a DGA Award for directing the series.
Ted Lasso continued its streak, winning best comedy series, best actor for Sudeikis, best supporting actor Brett Goldstein and best supporting actress Hannah Waddingham (the second year in a row the Apple TV+ show won in all categories for which it was nominated). Accepting for best comedy series, Waddingham shifted gears to show her support for Ukraine. “At the moment there are beautiful brothers and sisters, and for me more importantly, the babies in the Ukraine that are being utterly decimated at the moment from this putrid, putrid torrent of abuse,” she tearfully said. “Please think of them as much as you can and give as much as you can.”
Lifetime achievement honoree Billy Crystal also brought up his personal connection to Ukraine. “My grandmothers were from Odessa and Kiev,” he said, remembering that his first audience was his own family. They came to America “where they could live free from tyranny. Their laughter was the first laughs I ever got in my life, is the fuel that my engine is still burning today.”
Crystal also noted that Monday is his birthday, and he is currently in rehearsals for his upcoming Broadway musical, Mr. Saturday Night. “I can’t remember when I worked harder and had more fun on a project — and I’m serious,” he said. “I’ll be 74 tomorrow — I actually just can’t remember!”
Michael Keaton delivered one of the night’s most stirring speeches when accepting the award for best actor in a limited series for Hulu’s Dopesick, which offered a broad look at the opioid crisis affecting millions of Americans. “One thing I’m proud about regarding this series is I think we really treated all those folks down there [in Appalachia] and in the world with real dignity,” Keaton said, recalling a waitress he met while filming who was taking care of her grandchild because the parents were incapacitated because of addiction. “I think of all those women like my mom and my sisters. They’re tough. It seems to always fall onto them, those grandmothers who are raising babies” because their children can’t.
Keaton also expressed support for “fellow actor” Volodymyr Zelenskyy, president of Ukraine, telling him to “keep up the fight.” Closing his speech, Keaton added, “There’s only one way to change things environmentally, socially and for some sort of racial justice and social justice. Two words: voting rights.”
Read the full list of winners here.
Source: HollyWood
