7 Most Memorable Grownup Moments at the Oscars

Her many roles in real life — Miss Malaysia beauty queen, British Royal Academy of Dance ballerina, Hong Kong martial artist, breakout art-house star, Bond girl — prepared her for the part of an ordinary woman who would have become a Hong Kong movie star if she hadn’t married her loser husband and become an American laundromat owner. Her life story and her movie proved inspiring to Oscar voters and grownups reflecting on their own past and future dreams. “This is the beacon of hope and possibilities ... and ladies, don’t let anybody tell you you are ever past your prime,” Yeoh said while accepting the award. “I have to dedicate this to my mom, and all the moms, because they are the superheroes. She's 84 ... and I’m taking this home to her.”

Jamie Lee Curtis, winner of Best Actress in a Supporting Role.

Rodin Eckenroth/Getty Images

Jamie Lee Curtis, 64, fulfills a mother’s dream

The AARP Movies for Grownups Career Achievement Award winner nabbed the best supporting actress Oscar for her role in Everything Everywhere All at Once. Curtis’ mother, actress Janet Leigh, was Oscar nominated in the same category in 1961, for Psycho. She lost, and still became iconic. Curtis’ dad, Tony Curtis, was nominated for best actor for 1958’s The Defiant Ones.

Crediting everybody but herself, from the directors and crew to the “hundreds of thousands” of people who made her genre movies like Halloween astounding hits, Curtis said, “We just won an Oscar together!” It’s the capstone to her incredible career resurgence in her 60s, and a win for the values she espouses: authenticity, and disdain for the Botox and surgeries stars used to endure to deny aging. “My mother and my father were both nominated for Oscars,” exclaimed an emotional Curtis. “I just won an Oscar!”

Brendan Fraser holds up the Best Actor award for "The Whale."

Kevin Winter/Getty Images

Brendan Fraser, 54, hits the emotional jackpot

Some doubted Fraser could win best actor — even after winning the AARP Movies for Grownups best actor award, which many in the film world regard as an Oscar-predicting precursor award. But the Oscar best actor winner is usually in a best picture nominee, which The Whale wasn’t. Also, his stunning portrait of a guilt-tormented 600-pound man caused controversy and charges of fat-shaming. But the sheer force, difficulty and daring of his performance as an infinitely kind and regretful man at the end of his fraying rope, striving to reconnect with his estranged daughter, won voters over. In a year full of stars with inspiring comeback stories, his may have been the most titanic, after so many years in career limbo, and few acceptance speeches packed the emotional impact of his. His voice quavering, he thanked director Darren Aronofsky for “throwing me a career lifeline and hauling me aboard the good ship The Whale.”

Ke Huy Quan, winner of the Best Supporting Actor award.

Emma McIntyre/Getty Images

Child star Ke Huy Quan, now 51, grows up at last

Ke Huy Quan, 51, who fled Vietnam at 7 and was separated from his mother for over a year until the family reunited in Los Angeles, coached his brother on a movie casting call and wound up getting cast himself at 12 as the kid who saves Indie’s life in Spielberg’s Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Puberty killed his acting career, so he became a stunt coordinator and assistant director until, inspired by the success of 2018’s Crazy Rich Asians (with Michelle Yeoh), he made one last stab at stardom — and the supporting actor Oscar is the fifth major award he’s won this year, at 51. To play three utterly disparate versions of Yeoh’s character’s husband in Everything Everywhere All at Once (one for each parallel universe he occupies), he drew on all the ups and downs of his peripatetic roller-coaster life. Few child actors get to fulfill their promise as grownups, and older audiences exulted in his virtually unprecedented return to the limelight.

“My mom is 84 years old and she’s at home watching — Mom, I just won an Oscar!” said a weeping Quan when he accepted his award. “They say stories like this only happen in the movies. I can’t believe it’s happening to me. This, this is the American dream! To all of you out there — please keep your dreams alive!”

Everything Everywhere All at Once scores best picture

Daniel Scheinert and Daniel Kwan accept the Oscar for Best Picture for "Everything Everywhere All at Once" with the rest of the cast.

Rich Polk/Variety via Getty Images

The most exuberant multiverse movie ever won best picture (and six other Oscars) for its wildly inventive family drama about a Chinese immigrant who raids other dimensions and saves the world. This smart, arty blockbuster soared on the inspiring comeback stories of stars over 50: Michelle Yeoh and Ke Huy Quan, plus Jamie Lee Curtis’ ongoing, unstoppable comeback.

Navalny defies the odds yet again

Yulia Navalnaya, wife of Alexi Navalny, speaks as "Navalny" wins the award for Documentary Feature Film.

Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images

In what was arguably the most historically important Oscar speech, Yulia Navalnaya, clad in a flaming-red gown, acknowledged the best documentary award for Navalny. It’s about her husband, Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, 46, who left Russia after government thugs nearly killed him with poison, defiantly returned, and resides in Penal Colony 2 near Moscow, where he still courageously, sarcastically denounces President Vladimir Putin. Navalny is hilarious in the film, shot before his arrest, in which he fools his assailants into revealing their plot (they put the poison in his underwear to seep into his skin) while he records them. “My husband is in prison just for telling the truth,” said his activist wife Navalnaya. “I am dreaming of the day when you will be free and our country will be free. Stay strong, my love.”