Academy Awards Acceptance Speech Database

SANDRA BULLOCK:
Did I really earn this or did I just wear you all down? I would like to thank the Academy for allowing me in the last month to have the most incredible ride, with rooms full of artists that I see tonight and that I've worked with before and I hope to work with in the future, who inspire me and blaze trails for us. Four of them, that I've fallen deeply in love with, I share this night with and I share this award with. Gabby, I love you so much. You are exquisite. You are beyond words to me. Carey, your grace and your elegance and your beauty and your talent makes me sick. Helen, I feel like we are family, through(?) family, and I don't have the words to express just what I think of you. And Meryl, you know what I think of you, and you are such a good kisser.

I have so many people to thank for my good fortune in this lifetime, and this is a once-in-a-lifetime experience, I know. To the family that allowed me to play them, the Tuohy family. I know they're in here and you'll probably hear her in a minute... Maybe not. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to the family that made this film, that gave me the opportunity to do something different: John Lee Hancock, Gil Netter, Alcon, Warner Bros., the actors. Everyone who's shown me kindness when it wasn't fashionable, I thank you. To everyone who was mean to me when it wasn't... like George Clooney threw me in a pool years ago. I'm still holding a grudge.

But there's so many people to thank; not enough time. So I would like to thank what this film was about for me, which are the moms that take care of the babies and the children no matter where they come from. Those moms and parents never get thanked. I, in particular, failed to thank one. So... if I can take this moment to thank Helga B. for not letting me ride in cars with boys till I was eighteen, 'cause she was right; I would've done what she said I was gonna do. For making me practice every day when I got home, piano, ballet, whatever it is I wanted to be. She said to be an artist you had to practice every day. And for reminding her daughters that there's no race, no religion, no class system, no color, nothing, no sexual orientation, that makes us better than anyone else. We are all deserving of love. So, to that trailblazer who allowed me to have that, and this [referring to the Oscar], and this, I thank you so much for this opportunity that I share with these extraordinary women, and my lover Meryl Streep. Thank you.

[Ed. note: Bullock jokingly kissed Meryl Streep earlier in the year when they tied for best actress at the Critics Choice Awards.]