By winning the Best Actress award at the 98th Academy Awards for Hamnet, Jessie Buckley scripted history as the first Irish actress to receive the prize. While it is her first Oscar, it is not her first nomination, as she previously received a nod as a nominee for Best Supporting Actress for The Lost Daughter.
Buckley's Oscar win comes as the cherry on top after bagging best actress awards across ceremonies, including SAG-AFTRA’s Actor Awards, the BAFTAs, the Critics' Choice Awards and the Golden Globes. Having received the award, defeating fellow nominees Rose Byrne (If I Had Legs I’d Kick You), Kate Hudson (Song Sung Blue), Renate Reinsve (Sentimental Value) and Emma Stone (Bugonia), she expressed her gratitude to her competitors.
She said, “This is really something. I am inspired by your art and your heart, and I want to work with every single one of you." She then moved on to thank her family, mentioning that they were all at the ceremony because "Ireland bought them flights". "Mom, Dad, thank you for teaching us to dream and to never be defined by expectation but to care about your own passion," she said, looking up at the balcony, trying to place her family.
She had specific thank-you notes for her husband Freddie Sorensen and a mention for their eight-month-old daughter. To Sorensen, who was moved to tears, she said, “I love you, man. I love you. You’re the most incredible dad. You’re my best friend, and I want to have 20,000 more babies with you.” Mentioning her baby, she added, "She has no idea what’s going on and is probably dreaming of milk, but her mother winning an Oscar is kind of a big deal.”
Talking about Hamnet director Chloe Zhao, she continued, "To get to know these incandescent women and journey to understand the capacity of a mother’s love is the greatest collision of my life. I would like to dedicate this to the beautiful chaos of a mother’s heart,” Buckley said. “We all come from a lineage of women who continue to create against all odds."
Hamnet has Buckley as Agnes, a lady who develops feelings for William Shakespeare (Paul Mescal), a poor Latin tutor who later becomes a well-known playwright. The couple marries and has three kids in the historical fiction movie, but tragedy hits when their lone son, 11-year-old Hamnet, passes away from the plague. At this year's Oscars, the Focus Features movie received eight nominations, including best picture, best director (Zhao), and best adapted screenplay (Zhao and Maggie O'Farrell). It also received awards for best original soundtrack, casting, costume design, and production design.
