Laverne Cox: 'When a trans woman is called a man, that is an act of violence.', National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, Creating Change - 2014

29 January 2014, Houston, Texas, USA

Alright! Alright, everybody sit down. Oh, my goodness, oh. [mouths 'wow’]

Oh, you’re gonna make me cry!

Creating Change 2014, how are you feeling tonight?

[audience cheers]

I-I don’t know if I believe you. Creating Change 2014, how you feeling tonight!

[louder cheers]

Oh, jesus. I love you back! I love you back, baby, yes I do. Ima that, muah! I love you. I, I’d like to thank Cate Clinton for that lovely introduction, make some noise for Kate Clinton. And I’d like to thank everybody at the task force who made me being here possible tonight. Special shout-out to Daniel Pino, Mark Daley, Rea Carey, and recent hire at the Task Force brother Kylar Broadus—where is Kylar, is Kylar in the house? We love you Kylar Broadus, yes, yes we do!

Oh my god, this feels so amazing, all this love that you’re giving me tonight, I have—I have to say that a black transgender woman, from a working class background, raised by a single mother—that’s me—getting all this love tonight, this feels like the change I need to see more of in this country.

Cornel West reminds us, you’ve heard me say this a billion times, but justice is what love looks like in public, and this feels so just right now, yes. But– but I have to tell you, I have to tell you that I am not used to receiving this kind of love, everybody. I’m not used to it.

I’m, I’m trying, you know, some days [laughs] some days I wake up and I’m that three-, four-, five-; twelve-, thirteen-, fourteen-year-old kid in Mobile, Alabama who was bullied. Some days I wake up and I’m, I’m that kid who’s being chased home from school practically every day by groups of kids who wanted to beat me up because I did not act the way that people who are assigned male at birth are supposed to act.

Some days I wake up and I’m that sixth grader who swallowed a bottle of pills because I did not want to be myself anymore because I did not know how to be anybody else. And who I was, I was told was a sin, a problem, and I didn’t want to exist. Some days I wake up and I am that black, trans woman walking the streets of New York City hearing people yell, That’s a man, to me.

And I understand, I’ve come to understand that when a trans woman is called a man, that is an act of violence.

Some days I, I wake up and I am just a girl who wants to be loved, but I was told on more than one occasion by a man who told me that he loved me that he could not be seen in public with me, could not introduce me to friends and family because I am trans, and not only because I am trans, because people can tell I am trans. I am not passable enough by certain standards.

Some days I wake up and I don’t feel good enough. Because I’ve heard that over and over again. I’ve heard it from men I’ve dated, I’ve heard it from members of my own community who told me that I am not passable enough, that I should not go and get surgery for this and that and then I will be an acceptable trans woman.

Some days, I wake up and I have heard about another one of my transgender sisters who has been assaulted, raped, murdered.

[scattered shouts]

And there’s no justice.

Amen.

There will be justice.

Some days I wake up and it is just too much. It is too much to deal with, it’s too–there’s too much pain, there’s too much cultural trauma around being who I am. But. But then I think, I think we are a resilient people, I think about so many people—[applause] Yes. So many people who’ve come before me who made me being on this stage possible, people like Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson.

[cheering]

People like Miss Major.

[cheers]

People like Monica Roberts, Kylar Broadus.

People like Candice Cayne, who in 2007 became the first trans woman to have a recurring role on a primetime TV show. I would not be here without Candice Cayne.

And in the face of so much injustice, we are a resilient people. We are a fierce people. We are a beautiful people. I– I am so blessed, this past year I’ve gotten to- to meet so many people in our community. I’ve traveled across the country, and I, one major event for me happened last year in March, in Chicago.

[cheering]

Chicago’s in the house?

And it was the first ever Trans 100. The realization of the dream of Antonia D'Orsay and Jen Richards—and I think they’re here tonight, yeah? How you doing. Love you.

And-and it was so powerful being in the room with , in in an event created by and for trans people—what we were celebrating each other, doing it for ourselves. It was major for me, it– it shifted my thinking about who I am and what is possible, and I, and I found out about Chicago House TransLife Center. If you don’t know about Chicago House’s TransLife center, you need to find out. They’re doing amazing work, amazing amazing work.

There are so many folks doing amazing work all over this country. I got to meet Ruby Corado last year. She is the founder of Casa Ruby in Washington D.C., and she does, she does amazing outreach to the trans, specifically the trans Latina, communities, and– and Ruby is doing this work with so few resources but a lot of love and a lot of resilience. Now there’s a lot of people in this room tonight that might have some access to some resources that Ruby could use. There, so Ruby’s right there so you need to go in and talk to Ruby. She needs– she needs the money to keep doing this powerful work, the—

[cheering]

The reality– the reality is there are a lot of amazing people who are unsung, trans people who are unsung doing incredible work all over this country. I, um, many of you know that I had the pleasure of spending some time with a woman by the name of CeCe McDonald.

As many of you know, CeCe is now free.

For those of you who don’t know, CeCe McDonald is a beautiful, vibrant, brilliant African American transgender woman who on June 5th 2011 was just walking down the street with a group of her friends. And she heard racist slurs, anti-trans slurs, anti-gay slurs. And a fight broke out, and one of her attackers ended up dead. White supremacist, by the way, he had swastika tattoos on his chest. And CeCe was arrested on the spot, the only person arrested that night, and CeCe had a glass slashed in her face, her salivary gland was severed, she was bleeding, defending herself because she refused to be a statistic.

In this room, we are all familiar with the unfortunate statistics of the homicide rate of trans women in our community. It’s the highest—over 53% of GBTQ homicides in 2012 were trans women; 73% were people of color. But CeCe said, I will not go out like that.

And I have had the pleasure not only of meeting CeCe but of meeting the people who, who made us aware of CeCe’s story. CeCe had an amazing support team—Katie Burgess, um, EdTyson[?], the Trans Support Network in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Billy, um, near—I can’t think of Billy’s last name [laughs] [shout from audience]— thank you, Billy Navarro! Billy’s gonna kill me— and Billy Navarro and so many others on CeCe’s support staff who, who made sure that CeCe, while she was incarcerated, was not going to be disappeared.

Billy said something really powerful to me – we’re making a documentary about CeCe McDonald, and about the culture of violence against trans women, and when I spoke to Billy for the first time, Billy said to me about the, the media coverage of CeCe in the beginning of her case, said the media was upset because CeCe had the audacity to survive.

And– and trans women of color are not supposed to survive. We so often, so often people seem to prefer us to be dead. We have our Transgender Day of Remembrance, where it seems like one of the few times where people seem to speak the names of trans women– usually trans women and trans women of color.

And CeCe survived. And there are so many survivors out there, but CeCe’s survival and and her , her resilience was made possible because – because she was brilliant and she was amazing and she lead her support team in a, in an amazing way. But it was also possible because of the work of grassroots activists in Minneapolis Minnesota.

If it were not for those activists, we would— the story of CeCe Mcdonald would be what mainstream media wanted to tell us about her. They made sure we knew the real story. They made sure that we knew that CeCe was attacked because she was black, because she was trans, because she was a woman. And that she was railroaded by the criminal justice system because of all those things.

They’re doing amazing work in Minneapolis, but it’s with very few resources. They can use some resources in Minneapolis, Minnesota, too.

…After interviewing CeCe for the first time I, I visited her in when she was still incarcerated, in November of last year. And it was really emotional for me, but my biggest takeaway from the whole experience is that, I said to Jack Garress[?], my director, um, for the documentary—CeCe knows that she’s loved. It was so powerful to me that she would have such a positive and upbeat attitude considering everything that she has gone through.

She was – she was like my character on Orange Is the New Black, she was denied the proper dosage of hormones. And she advocated for herself, her supporters on the outside advocated for her, and she got the correct dosage.

On three different occasions, she was placed in solitary confinement, which is the practice for housing trans people far too often when they are incarcerated, but she advocated for herself and people on the outside advocated for her and got her out of solitary confinement.

For me, the way in which CeCe advocated for herself and the way in which her support community advocated for her is a template for how we can do activism all over this country. And it started, it started with CeCe, and it started with her having this profound sense of love for herself that everyone around her felt. Everybody I talked to who’s come in contact with CeCe talks about this woman who inspired them and who had so much hope and propelled them to have hope to and to fight for her behalf. Love, for a black trans woman, freed her, and kept her safe on the inside. Loving trans people, I believe, is a revolutionary act.

[cheering]

And I believe when we love someone, we respect them, and we listen to them, we feel that their voice matters. And- and we let them dictate the terms of who they are and what their story is.

[cheering]

Now, now, um, Kate Clinton mentioned uh—an interview that I did on this show, on the Katie Couric show? [cheers] And, for me, that moment was a really amazing example of creating change.

[applause]

And I only want to take partial credit for it [laughs]. It was Carmen Carrera saying that [cheering]— Carmen Carrera insisting that there are certain things about her that are private, that trans bodies are not to be subject to everyone’s gaze, [cheering and applause] and and objectification.

And I was so happy and honored to be able to have her back, on national television. Trans women supporting and loving each other is a revolutionary act.

[cheering]

Someone tweeted to me—my dear friend Janet Mock—y'all know Janet Mock? Her book Redefining Realness comes out Tuesday, I hope you all pre-ordered it. It’s major. But Janet and I were tweeting each other, and and I, I support her and love her and she’s shown similar lonve and support of me, and someone tweeted hashtag-the-scarcity-model-is-a-myth, that, that that we don’t need to be fighting each other for resources. There is enough to go around.

There is enough spotlight to go around if we love each other, and if– and if we remain teachable. I think that the biggest thing about the Katie Couric moment is that she did a follow-up on that Friday, saying that that moment was a teachable moment for her. And many of us have watched, for my entire life I’ve watched television, and watched folks interview trans people and ask all these invasive questions. I’ve been asked these questions on television before. But never before have I seen, in mainstream media, a discussion about what is appropriate and not appropriate to ask trans people.

[cheers]

And that is the change. That is a change, that is a change that we really really need. We can set the conversation. Jennifer Finney Boylan, she tweeted to me that for the first time we are setting the agenda for how our stories should be told. In mainstream media. Because we’ve been doing it for a long time, it just hasn’t gone mainstream—right?

And I want to let you know that it is because of you that the change happened. It wasn’t just about Carmen and me. It was about all of the tweets, and the blogs that you wrote, and the articles that you wrote and the radio shows you went on to talk about it afterwards and the other TV shows you went on and said, this is not acceptable.

And this is not to demonize Katie Couric, I love Katie Couric, but Katie Couric was just following the lead of so many journalists and talk show hosts over the years. For the past sixty years since Christine Jorgensen stepped off the plane, the conversation about trans people and mainstream media has centered on transition and surgery. And even when there are humanizing moments, that the, it is my contention that the transition and surgery conversation becomes the big take-away, becomes the sensational moment, and our humanity is left in the dust. And so much of the injustice that too many of us experience is not talked about.

We are changing the conversation right now.

[cheers and applause]

I- I am so happy to be a working actor, I mean it’s just [laugh] it’s a big deal. And on Orange Is the New Black, I play an incarcerated trans woman who, who is in prison because um, she… stole some credit cards. To finance her transition. Healthcare for trans people is a necessity.

[cheering]

It is not elective, it is not cosmetic, it is life-saving.

[cheering]

But we are more than our bodies. [from audience: “Yes!”]

We are more than our bodies. The criminalization of trans people is, is so pervasive in this culture. CeCe McDonald’s case is one example, and I am sure many of you are aware of a sixteen-year-old girl in California by the name of Jewlyes Gutierrez. Sixteen years old and, and was bullied like so many transgender youth; 78% of trans youth in grades K-12 experience harassment and bullying in school. Seventy-eight percent—that is unacceptable.

And after being taunted over, and over, and over again, Jewlyes defended herself. She and the, and the folks who bullied here were all suspended, but the District Attorney decided he would arrest her for assault.

For being bullied and defending herself. And she is the only one arrested, this—this pisses me off.

[noise and cheering from audience]

There is a system in place which seeks to make trans people, particularly trans people of color, disappear. And part of that is the criminal justice system.

I live in New York City now where there’ve been a lot of conversations about the stop-and-frisk policy and reforming it, but there really hasn’t been enough talk about how that policy affects trans people, particularly trans women of color.

Trans women are far too often profiled as sex workers and arrested, if they have more than one condom in their purse. This is a practice that happens all over the world. Criminalized simply for wearing a short skirt in the wrong neighborhood.

That shit is fucked up.

But that is part of a larger culture which assumes that trans people are illegitimate, that we are fake, that we are always and only the gender that we were assigned at birth. Arizona tried to criminalize going to the bathroom for transgender people. [noise from audience] Amen. Give it up! That was stopped.

But these are the fights that we have to wage every day just to, just have a sense of, of legitimacy. But we are resilient people, and we’re strong, and there are so many of you creating that change right here, right now, and back in your home cities. I'm—I'm—wow. [deep breath]

[shots from audience of “We love you!” and then cheering]

I love you back. I really do, you really don’t know, it’s just– [deep breath]

It really is a big deal to, to have this kind of support, um, being who I am and, and I hope it, I want everybody to get this, I want everybody to get this kind of love, I want to spread it around. I want to spread it around, I-I want to close by um, talking about a dear friend of mine, um, Jeremiah Johnson, who’s here somewhere. He is a brilliant AIDS activist and we were um, I has having a little freakout about my talk here tonight earlier today, and we were sitting in my hotel room chatting, and Jeremiah reminded me that he and I have these really difficult conversations across difference. Jeremiah is, is HIV-positive, and um, he reminded me that we’ve had difficult conversations where I didn’t exactly know what was the right thing to say to him, as an HIV-positive person, and he has not always known what the right thing to say to me, as a trans woman, but we still have the conversations. And we have them—

[applause]

We have those conversations with love, and with empathy, and, and with a desire to get to a level of understanding that we didn’t have before. And we want to support each other, and we want to be there for each other.

And I believe these are the kinds of conversations that we need to have more of in our community, where we are really there for each other across difference, because we are all LGBTQ, queer, you know, we have, but we have all these differences. We have so much that, that we have in common, but we have so many ways that make us different. And we can have conversations across those differences with love, and empathy, and vulnerability.

And so as we embark on creating change 2014, I want to, to, to send a lot of love to each and every one of you and, and implore you to have conversations over the next few days with love towards one another and, and yourselves

You know the whole , I want to say the whole self-love thing has always been kind of baffling to me, I’ve always been like love myself, how the heck am I supposed to do that! And, and I believe now I’m starting to understand, a little bit of what it means—that I don’t internalize all the negative things and negative stereotypes that people have about trans women of color. I don’t do that number on myself anymore. I don’t– [cheering] I don’t date men anymore who are ashamed to be seen in public with me. [more cheering]

I am starting to believe that in the deepest core of myself, that I am beautiful, I am smart, I am amazing.

[THE CHEERING]

And I want to give that to each and every one of you because you are beautiful, smart, and amazing. Happy Creating Change 2014, I love you all!

Thank you so much!

Patton Oswalt: 'So nice to be here amongst the least worst people in Hollywood', Opening monologue, WGA West Awards - 2018

11 February, Beverly Hilton Hotel, Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, USA

Good evening fellow Disney employees.

So nice to be here amongst the least worst people in Hollywood.

And also James Woods. Oh is he not here this year? he's not? Oh I wore nice shoes!

Oh,alright, I'm Patton Oswalt, and after an exhuastive six month investigation by the Writers Guild West and Writers Guild East, and all findings independently verified by a secret commission led by Ronan Farrow, and after passing a lie detector and DNA test, I've been chosen to be the host of tonight's WGA Awards.

We have three backups waiting in the wings. Just in case I ... misread the greenroom.

Right that was the long version of the joke, here's the shorter version we came up ... let's see if this one works:

I'm your host Patton Oswalt, or as Guillermo del Toro calls me, the shape of pudding, ha! Yes, pretty good? I owe my brother ten dollars.

What a breakthrough year it has been for wriiting! And I'm just talking about the New York Times and the Hollywood Reporter, folks.

This is my third year in a row hosting the WGA awards.

Just 97 more and I get syndication, folks.

By the way, look, I'm very happy to be back here hosting the WGA Awards. I would do this every year if you asked me, and I hope I'm not about to woke myself out of a job for a while, but given the current atmosphere, maybe get a female host next year. There are hilarious comedians and writers out there, get Morgan Murphy, get Apala Nantrilla, get the girls from Broad City! They'd be amazing.

I can always come back. I'm not going anywhere. I've plateaued, you can always get me.

Those guys are rocketing. Grab em while you can.

And I would also like to speak on behalf of all the awards show hosts when I say that hosting an awards show this year, is like hosting the worst murder mystery dinner ever. One of you is a murderer and that's not even the bad news.

It's really hard to believe that the actors and producers who yell at you every day turned out to be bad people! Can you believe that/

And I can't believve 'Handsmaid Tale' is nominated. That show is so unrealistic. I mean our government is not that organised.

Curb your enthusiasm is up for an award tonight.

Curb Your Enthusiasm premiered in 2000.= I can’t believe it’s been on for three seasons already.

It was a very rough year for Hollywood, but on the bright side, we managed to normalise Tonya Harding, and jerking off with peaches. So ...

So I’d just like to say, all my SAG friends have told me that Arnie would have got the nomination if he’d eaten that peach ... COM-MIT.

I’m going to wrap this up. We have a very very fun show.

Only to say, and I don’t want to get all maudlin, but, the world right now, needs writers.

More than ever, and I’m going to show you why. We have a concrete reason why.

I don’t know if you guys remember but during the 2008 Writers Guild strike, remember the networks were suddenly desperate for content,

‘yeah, I heard a little yeah ... yeah, I got my calves in shape’

But youi remember how desperate the networks were for content, so suddenly all the Hollywood producers, who had to make all their alimony payments, organised a huge summit meeting, just like at the beginning of The Warriors, and they realised that the best way to make shows without writers, was that you just point cameras at assholes. So the networks green lit a whole bunch of asshole filled reality shows, including a gaping shit shoot known as The Apprentice, and like a small malignant growth, inside the rectum of America’s sunbelt, began the unchecked ascent of Donald Trump.

So listen, to any producers watching. The next time you think about taking away writers jobs, or developing a show without a true scribe, I want you to imagine ... in fact I want you to close your eyes right now ... I want you to imagine President ... Theodore ... Nugent.

And never fuck with writers again.

And another thing ... for the love of god, please don’t reboot Barney Miller. That show was perfect. Do not reboot Barney Miller.

Now given the climate, the WGA thought it would be in poor taste to bring out some scantily clad women, to hand out the trophies, so instead tonight I present to you, the trophy maids ... [handmaid’s tale dress ups] The trophy maids will be handing out awards.

Fantastic, yes

Please give it up for Of William Goldman, and Of Gavin Pallone. There you go right there.

And then just to make sure there was no hint of sexual attraction on stage, the Guild hird me.

And while we understand you writers are generally seen but not heard, which is very unfair, we only have the room until 7.30. I’m sorry ... there’s a My Little Pony Convention, they signed on for it, the Bronies.

Groucho Marx: 'I want to thank those who voted for me to get this award', Honourary Oscar - 1974

2 April 1974, Los Angeles, USA

Thank you. I want to thank those who voted for me to get this award. I wish that Harpo and Chico could be here to share it with me, this great honor. I wish Margaret Dumont could be here, too. She was a great straight woman for me, even though she never understood any of my jokes. She used to say, "Julie, what are they laughing at?" But most of all I want to thank my mother, because without her we never would have been anything. And last of all I'd like to thank Erin Fleming who makes my life worth living and who understands all my jokes.

Charlie Chaplin: 'This is an emotional moment for me', Lifetime Achievement Award, Academy Awards - 1972

10 April 1972, Los Angeles, USA

Oh, thank you so much. This is an emotional moment for me, and words seem so futile, so feeble. I can only say thank you for the honor of inviting me here. And you're wonderful, sweet people. Thank you.

Lupita Nyong'o: 'I’m certain that the dead are standing about you and watching', Best Supporting Actor Oscar - 2014

11 March 2014, Los Angeles, USA

It doesn’t escape me for one moment that so much joy in my life is thanks to so much pain in someone else’s. And so I want to salute the spirit of Patsey for her guidance. And for Solomon, thank you for telling her story and your own. Steve McQueen, you charge everything you fashion with a breath of your own spirit. Thank you so much for putting me in this position. This has been the joy of my life. I’m certain that the dead are standing about you and watching and they are grateful and so am I.

Chiwetel, thank you for your fearlessness and how deeply you went into telling Solomon’s story. Michael Fassbender, thank you so much. You were my rock. Alfre and Sarah, it was a thrill to work with you. Joe Walker, the invisible performer in the editing room, thank you. Sean Bobbitt, Kalaadevi, Adruitha, Patty Norris, thank you, thank you, thank you, I could not be here without your work.

I want to thank my family for your training and the Yale School of Drama as well for your training. My friends, the Wilsons, this one’s for you. My brother, Junior, sitting by my side. Thank you so much. You are my best friend. And Ben, my other best friend, my chosen family.

When I look down at this golden statue, may it remind me and every little child that no matter where you’re from your dreams are valid.

Thank you.

Matthew McConaughey: 'That keeps me with someone to keep on chasing', Best Actor Oscar - 2014

2 March 2014, Los Angeles, USA

Thank you -- all of these performances were impeccable. In my opinion I didn't see a false note anywhere. I want to thank Jean-Marc Vallee our director. I want to thank Jared Leto and Jennifer Garner who I worked with daily.

There are three things that I need each day. One, I need something to look up to, another to look forward to, and another is someone to chase.

First off, I want to thank God because that's who I look up. He's graced my life with opportunities that I know are not of my hand or of any other hand. He's shown me that it's a scientific fact that gratitude reciprocates. In the words of the late Charlie Laughton, who said, ‘When you got God you got a friend and that friend is you.'

To my family is to what I look forward to. To my father who I know is up there right now with a big pot of gumbo, he has a big lemon meringue pie over there. He's probably in his underwear and has a big can of Miller Lite and he's dancing right now. To you dad, you taught me how to be a man.

To my mother who's here tonight, who taught me and my two older brothers -- demanded -- that we respect ourselves. And in turn we learned we were better able to learn how to respect others. Thank you for that mama.

To my wife, Camilla, and my kids Levi, Vida and Mr Stone (Livingstone), the courage you give me every time I walk through the door is unparallelled. You are the four people in my life that I want to make the most proud of me. Thank you.

And to my hero. That's who I chase. When I was 15 years old I had a very important person in my life come and ask me 'Who's your hero?' I said, 'I thought about it and it's me in ten years. So I turned 25 ten years later and that same person comes to me and goes, 'Are you a hero?' I said, 'Not even close!' She said why and I said, 'My hero is me at 35.' You see, every day, and every week, and every month, and every year of my life, my hero is always ten years away. I'm never going to be my hero. I'm not going to obtain that and that's fine with me because it keeps me with somebody to keep on chasing.

So to any of us, whatever those things are and whatever it is we look up to, whatever it is we look forward to and whoever it is we're chasing, to that I say Amen. To that I say alright, alright, alright. And just keep living, huh? Thank you.

Tom Hanks: 'The streets of heaven are too crowded with angels', Academy Award - 1995

21 March 1994, Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles, USA

Here's what I know. I could not be standing here without that undying love that was just sung about by, not Bruce [Springsteen], but Neil Young. And I have that in a lover that is so close to fine, we should all be able to experience such heaven right here on earth. I know also that, I should not be doing this, I should not be here, but I am because of the union of such filmmakers as Ed Saxon, Ron Nyswaner, Kristi Zea, Tak Fujimoto, Jonathan Demme -- who seems to have these [referring to the Oscar] attached to his limbs for every actor that works with him of late. And a cast that includes Antonio Banderas, who, second to my lover, is the only person I would trade for. And a cast that includes many other people, but the actor who really put his film image at risk, and shone because of his integrity, Mr. Denzel Washington, who I really must share this with.

I would not be standing here if it weren't for two very important men in my life, so... two that I haven't spoken with in awhile, but I had the pleasure of just the other evening. Mr. Rawley Farnsworth, who was my high school drama teacher, who taught me to act well the part, there all the glory lies. And one of my classmates under Mr. Farnsworth, Mr. John Gilkerson. I mention their names because they are two of the finest gay Americans, two wonderful men that I had the good fortune to be associated with, to fall under their inspiration at such a young age. I wish my babies could have the same sort of teacher, the same sort of friends.

And there lies my dilemma here tonight. I know that my work in this case is magnified by the fact that the streets of heaven are too crowded with angels. We know their names. They number a thousand for each one of the red ribbons that we wear here tonight. They finally rest in the warm embrace of the gracious creator of us all. A healing embrace that cools their fevers, that clears their skin, and allows their eyes to see the simple, self-evident, common sense truth that is made manifest by the benevolent creator of us all and was written down on paper by wise men, tolerant men, in the city of Philadelphia two hundred years ago. God bless you all. God have mercy on us all. And God bless America.

David Harbour: 'We will repel bullies, we will shelter freaks and outcasts', Stranger Things, Screen Actors Guild - 2017

29 January 2017, California, USA

Harbour was speaking for cast of Stranger Things which won SAG award for Best Ensemble. Trump became President 7 days earlier.

But this award from you, who take your craft seriously, and earnestly believe, like me, that great acting can change the world, is a call to arms for our fellow craftsmen and women to go deeper and, through our art, to battle against fear, self-centeredness and exclusivity of our predominantly narcissistic culture and through our craft to cultivate a more empathetic and understanding society... by revealing intimate truths that serve as a forceful reminder to folks that when they feel broken and afraid and tired, they are not alone. 

We are united in that we are all human beings and we are all together on this horrible, painful, joyous, exciting and mysterious ride that is being alive.

As we act in the continuing narrative of Stranger Things, we... will repel bullies, we will shelter freaks and outcasts, those who have no home, we will get past the lies, we will hunt monsters, and when we are at a loss amidst the hypocrisy and the casual violence of certain individuals and institutions, we will, as per chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the weak, the disenfranchised, and we will do it all with soul, with heart, and with joy. We thank you for this responsibility.

Pawel Pawlikowski: 'I would like to dedicate it to my late wife', Oscars Acceptance - 2015

22 February 2015, Dolby Theatre, Los Angeles, California, USA

Ah, god. How did I get here? We made a film about – as you saw, black and white – about the need for silence and withdrawal from the world and contemplation. And here we are at the epicenter of noise and world attention. Fantastic, you know, life is full of surprises.

So, I'd like to thank the Academy. I'm honored, surprised and overwhelmed. I'd like to thank the people who backed our film: the producers, Eric Abraham of Portobello, Piotr Dzieciol, Agnieszka Odorowicz of the Polish Film Institute, and many others. They backed – oh, and a U.S. distributor who did a great job [music begins to play] for very little money. Oh, wrap up. Good, okay. So, quickly to the… And to my Polish friends who are in front of the TV. The crew who were in the trenches with us and who are totally drunk now. And you are fantastic, you were brilliant. You carried me through this film. And you are what I love about Poland. You're resilient, courageous, brave and funny. [Music builds to a loud crescendo.] And you can take a drink. And "Ida," I would like to dedicate it to my late wife [music ends] and my parents, who are not among the living but who are totally inside this film, and they have a lot to do with the film. And my children, who are hopefully watching, who are still alive. [Audience applause builds loudly.] Thank you, thank you. Victor and Maria... [Music begins again.] Victor and Maria, I love you. You are the main prize. Thank you.

Matthew McConaughey: 'There are three things that I need each day', Oscars acceptance - 2014

2 March 2014, Dolby Theatre, Los Angeles, California, USA

Thank you to the academy for this. All six thousand members. Thank you to the other nominees. Thank you -- all of these performances were impeccable. In my opinion I didn't see a false note anywhere. I want to thank Jean-Marc Vallee our director. I want to thank Jared Leto and Jennifer Garner who I worked with daily.

There are three things that I need each day. One, I need something to look up to, another to look forward to, and another is someone to chase.

First off, I want to thank God because that's who I look up. He's graced my life with opportunities that I know are not of my hand or of any other human hand. He's shown me that it's a scientific fact that gratitude reciprocates. In the words of the late Charlie Laughton, who said, ‘When you got God you got a friend and that friend is you.'

To my family is to what I look forward to. To my father who I know is up there right now with a big pot of gumbo, he has a big lemon meringue pie over there. He's probably in his underwear and has a big can of Miller Lite and he's dancing right now. To you dad, you taught me how to be a man.

To my mother who's here tonight, who taught me and my two older brothers -- demanded -- that we respect ourselves. And in turn we learned we were better able to learn how to respect others. Thank you for that mama.

To my wife, Camilla, and my kids Levi, Vida and Mr Stone (Livingstone), the courage you give me every time I walk through the door is unparallelled. You are the four people in my life that I want to make the most proud of me. Thank you.

And to my hero. That's who I chase. When I was 15 years old I had a very important person in my life come and ask me 'Who's your hero?' I said, 'I thought about it and it's me in ten years. So I turned 25 ten years later and that same person comes to me and goes, 'Are you a hero?' I said, 'Not even close!' She said why and I said, 'My hero is me at 35.' You see, every day, and every week, and every month, and every year of my life, my hero is always ten years away. I'm never going to be my hero. I'm not going to obtain that and that's fine with me because it keeps me with somebody to keep on chasing.

So to any of us, whatever those things are and whatever it is we look up to, whatever it is we look forward to and whoever it is we're chasing, to that I say Amen. To that I say alright, alright, alright. And just keep living, huh? Thank you.

Oliver Stone: 'You don't have to fit in', Writers Guild of America - 2017

19 February 2017, Beverly Hilton Hotel, California, USA

It’d be remiss of me not to remind you, especially you younger writers, that you can be critical of your government and your society. You don’t have to fit in. It’s fashionable now to take shots at Republicans and Trump and avoid the Obamas and Clintons. But remember this: In the 13 wars we’ve started over the last 30 years and the $14 trillion we’ve spent, and the hundreds of thousands of lives that have perished from this earth, remember that it wasn’t one leader but a system, both Republican and Democrat.

And call it what you will, military industrial, security, money, media, complex.

It’s a system that has been perpetuated under the guise that these are just wars justifiable in the name of our flag that flies so produly over our lives.

Our country has become more prosperous for many but in the name of that wealth we cannot justify our system as a center for the world’s values. But we continue to create such war and chaos in the world.

No need to go through the victims, but we know we’ve intervened in more than 100 countries with invasion, regime change, economic chaos. Or hybrid war, soft power, whatever you want to call it, it’s war of some kind. In the end, it’s become a system leading to the death of this planet and the extinction of us all.

I’ve fought these people who practice war for most of my life. It’s a tiring game. And mostly you’ll get your ass kicked. With all the criticism and insults you’ll receive, and the flattery too, it’s important to remember, if you believe in what you’re saying and you can stay the course, you can make a difference.

I urge you to find a way to remain alone with yourself, listen to your silences, not always in a writer’s room. Try to find not what the crowd wants so that you can be successful, but try instead to find the true inner meaning of your life here on earth, and never give up on your heart in your struggle for peace, decency, and telling the truth.

Larry David: "I not only hate writing the shows, I hate all kinds of writing", WGA Awards, Paddy Chayefsky Laurel Award - 2011

2 February 2011, East Coast ceremony, New York City, USA

Jason Alexander: I first encountered Larry David — this is true — at the Improv Comedy Club in New York City in the mid 1980s. The man was introduced as a comic. He lurched out onto the stage sweating and profoundly uncomfortable, launched into some diatribe about the improper use of the tu form over the usted form in the Spanish language, and after — I kid you not — a minute and a half of incomprehensible banter about "Et tu, Brute?," he accused the audience of being ignorant, euphemisms of the female anatomy, threw down his microphone, and stormed from the stage.

    To my amazement, less than a few years later, I would attain heights of fame and fortune I had never imagined by playing a character who was a thinly disguised alter-ego for that very same man. And I thank God for that blessing every day.

Larry David: Thanks Jason, it was really sweet of you to do this, although I have no doubt I'll be getting a call from you in the next few weeks asking me to do something very distasteful in return. "Larry, my wife's doing a save the poultry event, she'd like you to be the guest speaker. I think you owe me I gave you the Paddy Chayefsky Award."

I also want to thank my pal, the brilliant Larry Charles, for doing the thankless task of making that video. I don't know who the guy is he's talking about, but I'd like to meet him, sound very cool. Okay, to the matter at and. First off, I just like to say to Paddy Chayefsky, I'm really, really sorry. Please don't blame me, I had nothing to do with it. Apparently some of the same people who made the decisions about our last strike were also involved in this. So don't take it out on me.

And if it's any consolation, I won't put the award where anybody can see it. I'm thinking basement. So maybe when they come to fix the pipes, the plumber might spot it, and if he asks me what it is I'll just tell him it's from bowling. What's really ironic about this whole thing is that I hate writing. Nothing puts me to sleep faster than picking up a pen. Within minutes, I'm out cold.

I not only hate writing the shows, I hate all kinds of writing. Recommendations, thank you notes, excusing my daughter from school, condolence letters ... Oh those are the worst. Any expression of sympathy. I'd rather blow my own head off and make probably have to write them to me. And, of course, this speech.

As soon as I found out about the award, I immediately called the Guild and asked them what the shortest speech on record was for anyone who's ever been given this. Its ruined my life for the last two months. Not five minutes have gone by without me saying to myself, "You stupid schmuck. Why did you do this?" I actually started resenting the Guild for choosing me. It's almost like they did it on purpose just to accept me. It's like a sick joke. It's not funny.

I'm only sorry my mother is not alive to be here tonight because there's no doubt she would have stood up not shouted, "Larry? Are you sure? You're giving an award to Larry? Morty, they're giving an award to Larry." Her great dream for me was to become a mailman. Her dream. That's her best-case scenario. "If only my boy could deliver the mail. Please God, that's not asking too much, and wear a uniform."

She literally begged me to take a civil service test. "Please Larry, take the test." She was like Rod Steiger in On the Waterfront begging Brando to take the money in the cab. "Please take the test. Take the civil service test, take it, take it." I said, "No." She said, "What are you going to do?" And I really didn't know. At the time I was supporting myself by driving a limo for an old lady who was half blind and had no idea that I wasn't wearing the uniform and that the car was filthy.

I did that for a year, and then one night I went to the Improv, saw a bunch of comedians, and I thought, Jesus, theses people seem just like me. They're complete losers who do nothing and get up and talk about how miserable they are. Are you kidding? I can do that. And it had the bonus of sounding like a cool thing to say to impress women when they ask what I did, although I soon discovered that was not the case at all. I could have said I was a mailman and done just as poorly.

I told my parents about wanting to be a comedian and my mother said, "You're not funny, Larry. I've never heard you say anything funny." And my father backed her up, "She's right, she's right. You're not funny. Why do you think you're funny? You're not funny." So, I started doing it, but as Jason alluded to, I was not all that successful. My therapist at the time said I wasn't really temperamentally suited for it for the simple reason that if the audience didn't laugh I would scream and curse them.

"You stupid, fucking morons. You don't know anything!" I remember even walking the streets in New York looking for good spots to live in case I ever became homeless. I would mentally note them. Yeah, yeah, 44th between 5th and 6th. Good steam vent, there's an overhang. I got to remember this. I bombed all the time. Got heckled unmercifully. People threw things at me. I wallowed in self-pity. "Why me? Why? Why can't I do anything? I don't understand. It's not fair."

And then in 1988, Jerry Seinfeld asked me to develop a show with him. I'd never written a half hour before. I didn't even know the format. The number of pages, I had no idea what I was doing. I prayed for the show not to get picked up. Doing one was hard enough. How could I possibly do 22? It was impossible. I thought of all the half hours on television. All of the one hours. How did the writers do it week after week? Even the bad shows I was admiring, just for the fact that they got gone. When it got picked up I cried. I thought, "Are they insane? Why are they picking up this show? What is it?"

Then after a few weeks, I remember I was filling out a form in the doctor's office, and in the space next to occupation, I put in writer for the first time. That made me feel really smart. Oh, Jesus, I'm a writer. Holy shit, this is very cool. Although, who knows, maybe if I filled in mailman I would have felt just as good about it.

Now as much as it pains me, I'm going to be a little gracious, even at the risk of boring you. I have to thank Chris Albrect and Budd Frieman from the Improv, and Rick Newman from Catch a Rising Star, who consistently gave me spots in New York even though more often than not I turned the crowd into an angry mob. Rick Ludwin from NBC who stuck his neck out to get Seinfeld on the air. Of course Jerry Seinfeld, without whom, I'd probably be sitting on that steam vent on 44th street, screaming obscenities at passers by. Everything I wrote he improved.

I could so say the same for Alec Berg, Jeff Schaffer, and Dave Mandel, who've done such great work on Curb these last few years and the main reason I continue to do it. The remarkable Seinfeld cast. It's unbelievable. When I did these things in real life, I was scorned, mocked, and shunned. When they did it on the show, people laughed and loved them.

And the incredible Curb cast who helped me enact my revenge fantasies with such aplomb. Chris Albrect again, for putting Curb on the air and allowing a bald man to star in a comedy for the first time since Phil Silvers played Bilko. Of course, he is bald, so maybe it wasn't such a big deal. And the current HBO team of Richard Plepler, Mike Lombardo, and Sue Naegle, who give me whatever I want. I only hope I don't spoil my children the way HBO has spoiled me. And finally the writer's guild for this award.

But you know, there's a disturbing element surrounding this. I've noticed that whenever something good happens to me, it's usually followed by something terrible. And this thing has got disaster and doom written all over it. I mean it's a great honour but it's not worth getting hit by a bus. So, thank you Writer's Guild for the death sentence. I only hope I live a few more months to enjoy it. Thank you.

Larry David: 'I never knew a person could be that funny', AFI Tribute to Mel Brooks - 2013

6 June 2013, Dolby Theater, Hollywood, California, USA

Lavishing praise on people does not come easy to me.

In fact I find it quite distasteful.

Let’s just say it's not my cup of tea.

Usually I have to wait for somebody to die to do it, and even then I have to give it a couple of years.

But not so tonight. When I first heard The 2000 Year Old Man, I was laughing so hard my father came into the room and turned off the record player. ‘What the hell is going on in here, Larry?’

See, my parents didn’t mind me chuckling at a comedy album, or a TV show.  A little chuckle was fine.

But this was something else entirely.

This was disturbing.

So out of the ordinary. I never knew a person could be that funny.

And from the very first moment I heard that album, from that moment on, I said to myself, I can never, ever, be a comedian.

What is the point?

So Mel Brooks didn’t get me into comedy. He kept me away from it. 

I wasted years doing nothing because of him.

No job, living at home, lying on the couch watching ‘Shindig’.

My parents were beside themselves. They cried themselves to sleep every night.

He killed them.

He killed my parents that little Jew bastard.

Working with Mel on my show was one of the great thrills of my life. And that season was inspired by what was possibly the greatest comedic premise that anyone has ever dreamed up. The Producers.

Mel Brooks: - 'Ba-bump! Ba-bump! Ba-bump!', Oscars acceptance 'The Producers' - 1969

14 April 1969, Dorothy Chandler Pavillion, Los Angeles, California, USA

Banter preceding speech between Frank Sinatra and Don Rickles

I want to thank the Academy of Arts, Sciences and money for this wonderful award.

Well I’ll just say what’s in my heart.

Ba-bump! Ba-bump! Ba-bump! Ba-bump!

But seriously, I’d like to thank Sidney Glazer, the producer of The Producers for producing The Producers.

Joseph E Levine and his wife Rosalie for distribtung the film.

I’d also like to thank Zero Mastell, I’d also like to thank Gene Wilder, I’d also like to thank Gene Wilder. I’d also like to thank Gene Wilder.

Thank you very much.

Patty Duke - 'But the best words I ever learned, were hello, enthusiasm and thank you', Emmy Award acceptance - 1970

7 June 1970, Los Angeles, California, USA

Duke was the first actress to win for a telemovie role. She was criticised at the time for being on drugs for this speech. She later spoke of battling a bipolar disorder.

Thank you

Thank you.

Thank you Mr Evans?

I know your over there somewhere.

You, mom, Happy birthday.

I've also been taught not to say thank you for too long.

But the best words I ever learned, were hello, enthusiasm and thank you.

Jeff Bridges: 'Good afternoon, my sweet prince', John Goodman's Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremony - 2017

10 March 2017, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA

[Reviving The Dude from 'The Big Lebowski']

He's a good actor, he's a good man, John Goodman.

He's one of us, he loves the outdoors and acting. As a showman, he has explored the stages from Los Angeles to New York -- we're talking Broadway here, man -- he's done some weird little movies, too. And he's lived, like so many men in prior generations have lived their lives. He is a man of his times, a man of our times, and he has become a legend.

In your wisdom lord, you have lived through John as you have through so many other bright, flowering, young actors before him. I'm talking about men like Clark Gable, Gabby Hayes, Roy Rogers -- to keep in the whole Western thing -- Groucho Marx, Jimmy Cagney. We could go on and on, but you get the idea.

These men had lived for what they loved, and so to had you, Walter. You have lived for acting that you have loved so well.

And so Walter Sobcheck, John Goodman ....

In accordance with what we think may be your final wishes, we have committed to these sidewalks in Hollywood -- in the bosom of Hollywood that you love so well -- a star. A star for you, a star because we love you so well ... what time is it? Afternoon? Good afternoon, my sweet prince.

Denzel Washington: 'Without commitment, you’ll never start, but more importantly, without consistency, you’ll never finish', NAACP Image Awards - 2017

11 February 2017, Pasadena, California, 2017

[Winner, Most Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture]

Thanks writers of Fences

Without commitment, you’ll never start, but more importantly, without consistency, you’ll never finish. It’s not easy. If it were easy there’d be no Kerry Washington. If it were easy there’d be no Taraji Henson, (corrects himself) P  Henson, it it were easy there’d be no Octavia Spencer. But Not only that, if it were easy there’d be no Viola Davis. If it were easy there’d be no Mykelti Williamson, no Stephen McKinley Henderson, no Russell Hornsby, if it were easy there’d be no Denzel Washington.

So, keep working, keep striving, never give up, fall down seven times, get up eight.

Ease is a greater threat to progress than hardship.

Ease is a greater threat to progress than hardship.

So keep moving, keep growing, keep learning.

See you at work.

Related content: Denzel Washington, UPenn Commencement, 'Fall forward', 2011

"Dress me up in army fatigues. Throw me on top of a moving train.  Ask me to play Malcolm X, Rubin Hurricane Carter, Alonzo from Training Day: I can do all that. 

But a commencement speech? It’s a very serious affair. Different ballgame. There’s literally thousands and thousands of people here."

Full transcript and video

Elaine May: 'Not only is Mike a brilliant director, he's also, really, Albert Einstein's cousin', salute to Mike Nichols, AFI Lifetime Achievement - 2010

8 June 2010, Hollywood, California, USA

This is a very emotional night for me because 10, 20, 30 years ago tonight I bought this dress ... I bought it for Mike's first lifetime achievement award

And at the time, he promised me that from then on he'd only do mediocre work so I wouldn't be inconvenienced again, and then year after year after year after year, he consistently broke his word.

So here I am tonight. And I think tonight, my speech for Mike will have a Yiddish theme.

Because as # said, not only is Mike a wonderful producer, a remarkable actor,  a brilliant director, he's also, really Albert Einstein's cousin. It is true!

It really is. There's a show on PBS, that's hosted by - I can barely read my hand - Robert Gates Jnr - I have always suspected this, because years ago, I was leafing through a Gutenberg Bible that Mike keeps on his coffee table,

And I found a letter, one page of a letter, it was a letter obviously written by Eisntein. I don't know to whom it was written because it was the second page.

I took that letter, thinking it was one of those little things that mike would never miss, I have that letter with me tonight. I'm going to read it.

[reaches into bra]

I just don't want to take out the wrong thing.

It's the second page.

[reading]

"Agitated, I moved away from the dinner party, and wandered into the kitchen, where Little Igor [Mike Nichols birth name was Mikhail Igor Peschkowsky] was finishing his mashed potatoes with peas. He ate the peas one at a time. On impulse I said to him, how can I explain to dinner guests that relative time equals distance over speed, without sounding pedantic? '

Little Igor paused over his pea. He said, 'a mother is forced to send her little boy away. Sitting on the train the boy is grief stricken. Suddenly he looks through the window and sees that there is another train standing still on the track beside his. And a little girl is looking at him through the window and smiling. For a moment the boy’s grief fades and he smiles and then we pull back [gestures camera move] and we see the heatbroken mother watching the two trains, which are actually racing away, but to the children smiiling at each other, through the window, the train seems to be standing still, because they are both travelling in the same direction, at the same speed.

And here Einstein writes: ‘It was at that moment I gave up my dream of being a director, and decided to stay with physics.'

And the last line:

"I said to the boy, I had no idea where you were going with that story', and that's as far as this letter goes.

I knew immediately that Little Igor was Mike, because I knew his name was Igor, and that's the way he still eats peas. But I never know where Mike's story is going either. I watch his movies, and I have no idea where they are going to go, and then when they get there I think, well, yeah, of course.

I watched The Graduate kill himself over this girl, and then he's with the mother, and then he tears her away from this guy when they're at her own wedding, and then when they're on the bus and he's won, he has nothing to say to her.

And you think, oh yeah, of course.

If you kept the camera on after the prince put the glass slipper on Cinderella's foot, what would he say to her? He'd say, ‘nice shoes’.

You don't know where Carnal Knowledge is going because there are no cliches. you can go crazy, your mind can't drift, you can't get popcorn, you don't know what's going to happen.  And Working Girl Away, you do know what 's going to happen, because Melanie Griffith is going to get Harrison Ford and she's beautiful and he's handsome and they’re both in business. They have something to talk about on the bus, because, they're in the markets.

They're probably one of the corporations that are funding this evening.

These scripts are all written by terrific writers, but if you're a writer, you really want Mike to direct your screenplay. Because you know that every shot and every costume and every piece of furniture and every shoe, and everything you see is going to tell your story. And never give it away.

I have to go back to my Jewish theme now, because I don't want to not be thematic. And here it is:

Albert Einstein was a very sad man when he died, because he never achieved a combined field theory and that’s gotta be depressing. In whatever dimension he may be in, if he’s watching tonight, I think he’d be immensely cheered up to discover he’s Mike Nichols’ cousin.

Meryl Streep, 'When the powerful use their position to bully others, we all lose', Golden Globes - 2017

8 January 2017, Los Angeles, California, USA

Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you. Please sit down. Please sit down. Thank you. I love you all. You'll have to forgive me. I've lost my voice in screaming and lamentation this weekend. And I have lost my mind sometime earlier this year. So I have to read.

Thank you, Hollywood foreign press. Just to pick up on what Hugh Laurie said. You and all of us in this room, really, belong to the most vilified segments in American society right now. Think about it. Hollywood, foreigners, and the press. But who are we? And, you know, what is Hollywood anyway? It's just a bunch of people from other places.

I was born and raised and created in the public schools of New Jersey. Viola [Davis] was born in a sharecropper's cabin in South Carolina, and grew up in Central falls, Long Island. Sarah Paulson was raised by a single mom in Brooklyn. Sarah Jessica Parker was one of seven or eight kids from Ohio. Amy Adams was born in Italy. Natalie Portman was born in Jerusalem. Where are their birth certificates? And the beautiful Ruth Negga was born in Ethiopia, raised in -- no, in Ireland, I do believe. And she's here nominated for playing a small town girl from Virginia. Ryan Gosling, like all the nicest people, is Canadian. And Dev Patel was born in Kenya, raised in London, is here for playing an Indian raised in Tasmania.

Hollywood is crawling with outsiders and foreigners. If you kick 'em all out, you'll have nothing to watch but football and mixed martial arts, which are not the arts. They gave me three seconds to say this. An actor's only job is to enter the lives of people who are different from us and let you feel what that feels like. And there were many, many, many powerful performances this year that did exactly that, breathtaking, passionate work.

There was one performance this year that stunned me. It sank its hooks in my heart. Not because it was good. There was nothing good about it. But it was effective and it did its job. It made its intended audience laugh and show their teeth. It was that moment when the person asking to sit in the most respected seat in our country imitated a disabled reporter, someone he outranked in privilege, power, and the capacity to fight back. It kind of broke my heart when I saw it. I still can't get it out of my head because it wasn't in a movie. It was real life.

And this instinct to humiliate, when it's modeled by someone in the public platform, by someone powerful, it filters down into everybody's life, because it kind of gives permission for other people to do the same thing. Disrespect invites disrespect. Violence incites violence. When the powerful use their position to bully others, we all lose.

This brings me to the press. We need the principled press to hold power to account, to call them on the carpet for every outrage.That's why our founders enshrined the press and its freedoms in our constitution. So I only ask the famously well-heeled Hollywood Foreign Press and all of us in our community to join me in supporting the committee to protect journalists. Because we're going to need them going forward. And they'll need us to safeguard the truth.

One more thing. Once when I was standing around on the set one day whining about something, we were going to work through supper, or the long hours or whatever, Tommy Lee Jones said to me, isn't it such a privilege, Meryl, just to be an actor. Yeah, it is. And we have to remind each other of the privilege and the responsibility of the act of empathy. We should all be very proud of the work Hollywood honors here tonight.

As my friend, the dear departed Princess Leia, said to me once, take your broken heart, make it into art. Thank you.

Carrie Fisher: 'But like any abused child wearing a metal bikini, chained to a giant slug about to die, I keep coming back for more', AFI Roast of George Lucas - 2005

29 O)ctober 2005, AFI Liftetime Achievement Awards, California, USA

Hi, I'm Mrs. Han Solo, and I'm an alcoholic.

I'm an alcoholic because George Lucas ruined my life.

I mean that in the nicest possible way. Fifty-seven years ago, I did his little 'Star Wars' film, a cult film that then went on to redefine what they laughingly refer to as "the face of cinema." And now, sixty-five years later, people are still asking me if I knew it was going to be that big of a hit.

Yes, I knew. We all knew.

The only one who didn't know was George.

We kept it from him, because we wanted to see what his faced looked like when it changed expression.

George is a sadist. But, like any abused child wearing a metal bikini chained to a giant slug about to die, I keep coming back for more.

Only a man like George could bring us whole new worlds populated by vivid extraordinary characters, and providing Mark and Harrison and myself with enough fan mail, and even a small merry band of stalkers -- it's lovely -– keeping us entertained for the rest of our unnatural lives.

George, the fact that you made me into a little doll that my first husband could stick pins into ... a shampoo bottle where people could twist my head off and pour liquid out of my neck – "lather up with Leia and you'll feel like a princess yourself!" ... and yes, the little Pez dispensers so my daughter Billie could pull my head back and pull the wafer out of my neck every time she doesn't want to do her homework ... I suppose I don't mind.

And though amongst your many possessions you have owned my likeness lo these many years, so that every time I look in the mirror I have to send you a check for a couple of bucks.

Not to mention you had the unmitigated gall to let that chick – the new girl, who plays my mother, Queen Armadillo, or whatever her name is? – she wears a new hairstyle and outfit practically every time she walks through a door!

I mean, I bet she even got to wear a bra, even though you told me I couldn't, "because there was no underwear in space!" I'm only slightly bitter, because you, my formerly silent friend, are an extraordinary talent, and let's face it, an artist -- the like of which is seen perhaps once in a generation, who helps define that generation -- and who deserves every award I now spend the latter half of my Leia-laden life helping to hurl your way!

And in conclusion, your honor, I hope I slept with you to get the job, because if not, who the Hell was that guy?!?"