Eddie Redmayne Wins Best Actor at the 2015 Oscars, Could Not Be More Humble, Grateful and Adorable in His Speech

British star channeled physicist Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything

By Natalie Finn Feb 23, 2015 5:11 AMTags
Eddie Redmayne, 2015 Academy Awards, WinnerKevin Winter/Getty Images

Eddie Redmayne has done it.

Despite trading off with Michael Keaton here and there through awards season, the British star of The Theory of Everything was the last man standing tonight, Oscar night.

He notched the Best Actor win for channeling physicist Stephen Hawking and couldn't have been more gracious and positively adorable up on that stage. First, of course, wife Hannah Bagshawe scored the kiss of the night, and then presenter Cate Blanchett got a pretty grand-looking hug.

By the time he started talking, he was beaming with emotion and we couldn't have been happier for him.

ROBYN BECK/AFP/Getty Images

"Thank you, thank you," he began. "Thank you to the Academy. I don't think I'm capable of articulating quite how I feel right now. I am fully aware that I am a lucky, lucky man. This Oscar—wow!"

Even he had to stop just for a second to savor the moment.

"Um, this Oscar... This belongs to all of those people around the world battling ALS. It belongs to one exceptional family, Stephen, Jane, Jonathan, and the Hawking children. And I will be its custodian and I will promise you I will look after him. I will polish him. I will answer his beck and call and I will wait on him hand and foot."

Redmayne continued to thank his big-screen wife, "my staggering partner in crime, Felicity Jones" as well as "my ferocious and yet incredibly kind director, James Marsh," and the many members of his "ingenious team."

"Now, finally, please, this is so extraordinary," he concluded. "My family and you," he pointed to the audience, "Hannah, my wife, we have a new fellow coming to share our apartment!"

We're just going to have to assume he meant Oscar.