Oscars Quiz 2023: Who’s the first Asian to win in a lead role?

Michelle Yeoh won Best Actress at the 95th Academy Awards for her role in “Everything Everywhere All at Once.” She dedicated her award to her father, who passed away last year. Yuh-Jung Youn won Best Supporting Actress in 2021 for her performance in “Minari.”

Michelle Yeoh, a former Miss Malaysia and a stuntwoman landed her first role in a Hollywood film at 59. On the other hand, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences took 95 years to recognize an Asian actress in its leading actress category. However, some recordkeepers consider Merle Oberon and Vivien Leigh, born in British-colonized India but white-passed, to be the first Asian best actress nominees.

“Everything Everywhere All at Once” is the very first superhero movie to win Best Picture at the Oscars. Directed by Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, the film was praised for its inventive and humorous exploration of identity, culture, and quantum physics.

Ke Huy Quan won Best Supporting Actor at the 95th Academy Awards for his role in “Everything Everywhere All at Once.” He gave an emotional speech in which he thanked his wife, mother, brother, and fans. He also shared his story of being a refugee from Vietnam and achieving the American dream.

Fun Fact: As a child in the ’80s, Quan played Short Round in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Data in The Goonies.

“Everything Everywhere All at Once” won a total of seven Oscars at the 95th Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Original Screenplay, Directing, and three acting awards.

Brendan Fraser won Best Actor at the 95th Academy Awards for his role in “The Whale.” The film tells the story of a morbidly obese man who tries to reconnect with his estranged daughter. He gained over 100 pounds for the role and received critical acclaim for his performance.

“Pinocchio,” a stop-motion animated film directed by Guillermo del Toro, won Best Animated Feature at the 95th Academy Awards. The film is a dark and twisted version of the classic tale by Carlo Collodi, set in fascist Italy during the 1930s.

Disney received the most nominations overall for the 2023 Academy Awards, with 22, for “Avatar: The Way of Water,” “The Banshees of Inisherin,” and “Turning Red.” “The Banshees of Inisherin” got four acting nods. With six awards, Disney had to settle for second place regarding actual wins. A24 won nine awards out of its 18 nominations for “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and “The Whale,” including best picture and all four acting categories, to become the studio with the most wins.

“Navalny,” a documentary directed by Alex Gibney, won Best Documentary Feature at the 95th Academy Awards. It’s CNN’s first Oscar win. The CNN film covers Alexei Navalny’s poisoning, recovery, arrest, trial, and the following protests and crackdowns. Navalny died in prison on Feb. 16, 2024.

Sarah Polley won Best Adapted Screenplay at the 95th Academy Awards for “Women Talking,” a movie based on the novel by Miriam Toews. The movie tells the story of a group of Mennonite women who discuss their experiences of sexual assault. They also discuss their plans to rebel against the men who have oppressed them for years.

“RRR,” a Telugu-language period action film directed by S. S. Rajamouli, won Best Original Song at the 95th Academy Awards for its title track, Naatu Naatu, composed by M. M. Keeravani and sung by Anirudh Ravichander. It is the first Indian film to win an Oscar in this category.

The Oscars laid a champagne-colored carpet instead of the usual red one, presumably to add some sparkle to the ceremony. However, the choice also led to some last-minute scrambling after a rainy weekend. This left organizers cutting up sections of the carpet ruined by bad weather and dirty shoe soles.

Sidney Poitier was the first African American and first Bahamian to win the Academy Award for Best Actor for Lilies of the Field. He died on Jan. 6, 2022, in Los Angeles. He was 94.

How long did it take for the second African American to win the Academy Award for Best Actor?

It took seven years for James Earl Jones to become the second Black person to earn an Oscar nomination for Best Actor in 1970. It took some extra three decades for Denzel Washington to win the category in 2001 (for “Training Day”), becoming the second African-American actor to receive the award for Best Actor. The same year saw the first time two African-American performers won Oscars in the same year, the other being Halle Berry, for “Monster’s Ball.” Berry is the first African-American actress to win Best Actress.

Chloé Zhao became the first woman of color to win the best director at the 2021 Academy Awards. She is also the youngest woman to win the award and the second woman to receive it in Oscars history.

Who was the youngest person to win the best director at the Oscars?

The youngest director to receive the Oscar for best director was Damien Chazelle in 2017 for La La Land.

Who was the first Asian to win the best director?

The first Asian to win the best director at the Oscars was Ang Lee for 2005’s Brokeback Mountain, making him the first person of color to win the award.

Who was the first woman to win the Oscar for best director?

Kathryn Bigelow is the first woman to have won the Academy Award for best director for 2009’s The Hurt Locker.

Adrien Brody was 29-years-343-days-old when he won the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for his appearance in 2002’s The Pianist, making him the youngest recipient ever to win the award.

Is Adrien Brody in Wes Anderson’s The French Dispatch?

Adrien Brody stars alongside Bill Murrey in Wes Anderson’s 2021 movie, The French Dispatch. The film is an ode to print journalism, and a tribute to the New Yorker magazine, with the editor portrayed by Bill Murray. Tilda Swinton portrays an art critic, Frances McDormand plays a writer who does a deep-dive into a student revolutionary scene, and Brody plays an art dealer who tries to make an international art star out of a twice-convicted murderer (Benicio Del Toro). Watch the trailer.

Anthony Hopkins won the best actor Oscar at the 93rd Academy Awards Sunday, April 25, 2021. Hopkins, 83, became the oldest ever acting Oscar winner. The honor was previously held by the late Christopher Plummer, 82 when he won for Beginners in 2011.

What role did Hopkins win the Oscar for in 2021?

Anthony Hopkins won for his performance as an elderly man with dementia in “The Father,” directed by French novelist and playwright Florian Zeller.

What was Hopkins’s previous Oscar win?

Anthony Hopkins won the best actor Oscar in 1994 for his role as Hannibal Lecter in “The Silence of the Lambs.”

Glenn Close was nominated for 8 Oscars over the years, including 2021’s “Hillbilly Elegy,” but won none. She shares the record with Peter O’Toole (Lawrence of Arabia).

The last time the winners of best actress and best actor were from the same film was 1998 when Helen Hunt and Jack Nicholson scored the double for As Good As It Gets.

Burt Bacharach and Hal David won the 1969 Academy award for writing Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head for “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.” B.J. Thomas famously performed the Oscar-winning song. The Grammy-winning singer died from lung cancer complications onMay 29, 2021, at his home in Arlington, Texas. He was 78.

William Hurt won the best-actor Oscar for the 1985 film “Kiss of the Spider Woman.” “Children of a Lesser God” and “Broadcast News” earned him best-actor Oscar nominations in 1983 and 1984, meaning he was nominated for the award in three consecutive years. Hurt died at his home in Portland, Oregon, on March 13, 2022. He was 71.

1990’s Home Alone earned two Oscar nominations for John Williams’ score and original song. Chris Columbus directed the classic comedy, written by John Hugues and starring Macaulay Culkin.

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross are American industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails. Singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer Trent Reznor was the only permanent band member until the English musician Atticus Ross officially joined the band in 2016.

Which Oscars have they won?

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross won their second Oscar for “Soul” in 2021, a little over a decade after their first win for “The Social Network.” They took the prize with Jon Batiste for Best Original Score for their collective work on the Pixar film.

Troy Kotsur joined “CODA” costar Marlee Matlin on March 27, 2022, as the only deaf Oscar winners. He won the best supporting actor award at the Academy Awards for portraying the father of a deaf family with a hearing child. Matlin was the first deaf person to win the prize when she became the youngest best actress winner at age 21 for the 1986 drama “Children of a Lesser God.”

Ariana DeBose is the first openly LGBTQ actor to win an Oscar.

What about the rest?

While Tilda Swinton openly identified in 2021 as queer, that was not the case when she won the Oscar for Michael Clayton in 2007. Kevin Spacy came out publicly in 2017 amid sexual assault accusations against him, 18 years after winning the Best Actor award for American Beauty. The late John Gielgud publicly acknowledged his relationship with his long-time lover, Martin Hensler, in 1988 – seven years after winning his Oscar for Arthur.

Brie Larson (who won the Oscar for “Room”) joins the “Fast & Furious” cast as a new character named Tess in the 2023 sequel, “Fast X.” Among the returning cast for the franchise’s 10th installment are Helen Mirren’s (“ The Queen”) Magdalene “Queenie” Ellmanson-Shaw and Charlize Theron’s (“Monster”) ultimate villain Cipher. A trailer for the film introduces Rita Moreno (“West Side Story”) as Dom, Mia, and Jakob’s grandmother, Abuelita Toretto, bringing the franchise’s count of Oscar-winning performers to four. “Fast X” is set to hit theaters on May 19, 2023. Watch the trailer.

Alan Arkin’s performance as George Aaronow in Glengarry Glen Ross was memorable but did not award him an Oscar. He died on June 29, 2023, at 89. Arkin won an Oscar in 2006 for his performance in Little Miss Sunshine, for which he also won the BAFTA award, and was nominated for three other Oscars and six Emmys in his career. He was also a Tony Award-winning actor and won a Golden Globe award in 1967 for his first major film role in “The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming.”

At the ripe age of 81, Martin Scorsese made Oscar history by becoming the oldest directing nominee ever for his work on “Killers of the Flower Moon.” Despite being in a career phase where most would consider retirement, Scorsese proves that talent and passion for cinema know no age limits. This is his 10th movie nominated for Best Picture, which is also an all-time record.

Rita Moreno won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar in 1962 for her role as Anita in “West Side Story,” making her the first Latina ever to win an Oscar. 60 years later, in 2022, Ariana DeBose became the second Latina and first Afro-Latina actor to win the award – for the same role in the Steven Spielberg version of the film.