An awards season full of unpredictable twists came to a close with Sunday night’s 97th Academy Awards. Director Sean Baker’s rollicking Anora was the night’s big winner, scoring Oscars for five of its six nominations, including for Best Picture.

Much of the show played out exactly as predicted, with A Real Pain’s Kieran Culkin winning Best Actor in a Supporting Role, Emilia Pérez’s Zoe Saldaña winning Best Actress in a Supporting Role, and The Brutalist’s Adrien Brody winning Best Actor in a Leading Role.

Related

Karla Sofía Gascón just became the first out trans actor to score an Oscar nomination
Along with her history-making Best Actress nod, Gascón’s film ‘Emilia Pérez’ earned more nominations than any other film.

But Anora star Mikey Madison’s win for Best Actress in a Leading Role represented the night’s most shocking upset, as Demi Moore had been a favorite to win for her role in The Substance. In the end, however, French director Coralie Fargeat’s polarizing feminist body horror flick took home only one of the five awards for which it was nominated, scoring the Oscar for Best Makeup and Hairstyling.

Never Miss a Beat

Subscribe to our newsletter to stay ahead of the latest LGBTQ+ political news and insights.
Subscribe to our Newsletter today

Baker was a delightful presence during the ceremony, taking the stage four times to accept awards for Best Director, Original Screenplay, and Editing as well as for Best Picture. The director, who rose to prominence with Tangerine, his acclaimed 2015 film about transgender sex workers, also set a new record for the most Oscars won by a single person for the same film.

Of this year’s queer nominees, which included Cynthia Erivo and Colman Domingo, only two took home awards during the Oscars telecast. Wicked costume designer Paul Tazewell accepted the Academy Award for Best Costume Design from out actor Bowen Yang, who actually wore one of Tazewell’s costumes from the film. In his speech, Tazewell noted that he is the first Black man to win the Oscar for Best Costume Design.

Wicked also took home the award for Production Design. Accepting the Oscar along with production designer Nathan Crowley, set decorator Lee Sandales thanked his husband in his speech.

Many of the show’s queerest moments came courtesy of Wicked. The film’s stars Arianna Grande and Cynthia Erivo opened the telecast, with Grande singing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” from The Wizard of Oz and Erivo singing “Home” from The Wiz before launching into a showstopping performance of “Defying Gravity.”