Emma Watson Wins Best Actor at MTV Awards, Celebates Diversity in Acceptance Speech (Video)

Emma Watson Wins Best Actor at MTV Awards, Celebates Diversity in Acceptance Speech (Video)

Emma Watson hits the stage to accept the award for Best Actor in a Movie at the 2017 MTV Movie & TV Awards held at the Shrine Auditorium on Sunday (May 7) in Los Angeles.

The 27-year-old actress won the first acting award not separated by gender boundaries and she made sure to note it in her speech.

“Firstly, I feel I have to say something about the award itself. The first acting award in history that doesn’t separate nominees based on their sex says something about how we perceive the human experience,” Emma said during her speech. “MTV’s move to create a gender-less award for acting will mean something different to everyone. But to me, it indicates that acting is about the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes. And that doesn’t need to be separated into two different categories.”

Emma won for her work in Beauty and the Beast and she noted that fans probably gave her the award “because of who Belle is and what she represents.”

Click inside to read the text of the full speech…

Emma Watson’s Full Speech

Firstly, I feel I have to say something about the award itself. The first acting award in history that doesn’t separate nominees based on their sex says something about how we perceive the human experience. MTV’s move to create a gender-less award for acting will mean something different to everyone. But to me, it indicates that acting is about the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes. And that doesn’t need to be separated into two different categories.

This is very meaningful to me. Both to be winning the award and to be receiving it from you, Asia [Kate Dillon]. Thank you for educating me in such—in such an inclusive, patient, and loving way. Thank you so much. I think I’m being given this award for a performance as an actor, but it doesn’t feel like that what it’s really for, although I am very grateful if you did think that I did a good job because the whole singing part of the situation was pretty terrifying—yeah, not kidding about that part!

But more seriously, I think I am being given this award because of who Belle is and what she represents. The villagers in our fairy tale wanted to make Belle believe that the world is smaller than the way she saw it, with fewer opportunities for her—that her curiosity and passion for knowledge and her desire for more in life were grounds for alienation. I loved playing someone who didn’t listen to any of that. I’m so proud to be a part of a film that celebrates diversity, literacy, inclusion, joy, and love the way that this one does.

I want to thank Linda Woolverton for writing the original Belle, Jeanne-Marie LePrince de Beaumont for writing what the animated movie was based on, and Paige O’Hara for playing Belle in the original. And I want to thank every single person who voted for me. Thank you so much. Taraji [P. Henson], I can’t see you, but Daniel [Kaluuya], James [McAvoy], Hailee [Steinfeld], all of you, it’s a privilege to have been nominated alongside you. Lastly I want to thank any one and everyone who had anything to do with giving me this opportunity and for supporting me on that journey. You know who you are, and I can’t thank you enough. Thank you so, so much.

To watch the full video, visit MTV.com.


via Source