Wes Anderson opens up about why he skipped Oscars 2024

Earlier, we reported that Wes Anderson's The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar won the Best Live-Action Short Film Oscar and that he was not there to receive it in person. The other day, the director of films such as Bottle Rocket, Moonrise Kingdom, and The Grand Budapest Hotel told Deadline why he did not attend the event and what he would have said in his Oscar speech had he been there.

“If I could have been there, I (along with [producer] Steven Rales) would have said ‘Thank You’ to: the family of Roald Dahl; the team at Netflix; Benedict [Cumberbatch] and Ralph [Fiennes] and Ben Kingsley and Dev [Patel] … and more [of the cast and crew],” said Anderson. “And also: If I had not met Owen Wilson in a corridor at the University of Texas between classes when I was 18 years old, I would certainly not be receiving this award tonight — but unfortunately Steven and I are in Germany and we start shooting our new movie early tomorrow morning, so I did not actually receive the award [in person] or get a chance to say any of that.”

The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar features Benedict Cumberbatch and Dev Patel in lead roles and is based on Roald Dahl's short story of the same name. It won the Oscar over the other nominees Red, White and Blue, The After, Invincible, Knight of Fortune. It fetched Anderson his first Oscar from his eight nomination.