In his acceptance speech, Cuaron
thanked, “The wise guys at Warner Bros.,” before catching himself and amending
the phrase to “the wise people at Warner Bros.” The Mexican director devoted
four years of his life to making the technically challenging film about a space
mission gone wrong.
“Gravity’s”
other Oscars are for original score, visual effects, sound mixing and sound
editing, cinematography and film editing.
Matthew
McConaughey won best actor for his performance in “Dallas Buyers Club.” His
co-star, Jared Leto, won best supporting actor, and the film won for makeup and
hairstyling.
Cate
Blanchett won best actress for her performance in “Blue Jasmine.”
“12 Years a
Slave” had two key awards at Sunday’s 86th Academy Awards: best supporting
actress and adapted screenplay.
Newcomer
Lupita Nyong’o won best supporting actress.
“It doesn’t
escape me for one moment that so much joy in my life is because of so much pain
in someone else’s,” Nyong’o said, paying tribute to her character, Patsey, a
slave in 1840s Louisiana. Her voice cracked noticeably as she spoke.
“Let It Go,”
from the animated film “Frozen,” won best song. Robert Lopez, one of its
songwriters, became an EGOT with his Oscar win: He now has an Emmy, Grammy,
Oscar and Tony.
“Frozen” also for won best animated
feature.
Darlene Love,
one of the singers featured in documentary winner “20 Feet From Stardom,”
launched into an impromptu version of “His Eye Is on the Sparrow” upon the film’s
win. Her full-throated take brought down the house.
“The Great
Gatsby” won two Oscars, for production design and costume design. Italy’s “The
Great Beauty” took home the Oscar for foreign-language film.
The “In
Memoriam” segment, which has received scrutiny in recent years after certain
omissions, included notables who recently died -- among them Sid Caesar, Harold
Ramis and Shirley Temple Black -- and concluded with Philip Seymour Hoffman.
Ellen
DeGeneres managed to set a social media record with a celebrity-filled selfie
that was retweeted more times than any photograph in Twitter history. She went
into the audience and gathered a number of stars -- including Meryl Streep,
Kevin Spacey and Bradley Cooper, who shot the image -- and encouraged people to
send it around the Internet. She had a pretty good head start, given that she
has more than 25 million followers on Twitter.
Amy Adams,
who was a best actress nominee for “American Hustle,” confessed to being
nervous, even though she’s been nominated four other times.
“I woke up at
5 a.m. I couldn’t get back to sleep,” she told CNN’s Piers Morgan on the red
carpet.
Still, the
main attraction of the 2014 Oscars isn’t so much the winners. It’s the event --
a showbiz extravaganza once described by Johnny Carson as “two hours of
sparkling entertainment spread over a four-hour show.”
Among this
year’s segments is a tribute to the 1939 film “The Wizard of Oz,” which is
celebrating its 75th anniversary this year. Morgan talked with the children of “Oz”
star Judy Garland -- Minnelli and Lorna and Joey Luft -- on the red carpet.
Asked who was
the best singer in the family, Minnelli -- an Oscar winner for “Cabaret” --
responded quickly.
“Mama, we all
know that,” she said.
For “12 Years”
actress Alfre Woodard, very little of the glitter matters.
Asked by
Morgan what she was wearing, Woodard laughingly turned the question back toward
the work that got all the nominees to the red carpet in the first place.
“I hope I’m
wearing my talent tonight,” she said. (CNN)