In one of the biggest ironies of the 2024 Oscars, Wes Anderson — whose fans had been waiting for him to win an Oscar since The Royal Tenenbaums‘ nomination in 2001 — won his first-ever Academy Award but was unable to accept it in person. While the auteur didn’t get a chance to give his acceptance speech onstage, Netflix shared his statement on his win.
“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],” the filmmaker wrote.
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Anderson’s adaptation of Roald Dahl’s The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar received the Academy Award for best live-action short film. Benedict Cumberbatch stars as the titular character, who develops clairvoyant abilities, allowing him to cheat at gambling.
Anderson’s statement continued, “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 film Anderson mentioned is reportedly The Phoenician Scheme, starring Benicio Del Toro, Michael Cera and Bill Murray. Roman Coppola is also credited as a co-writer. Last September, Anderson was awarded 1.5 million euros in funding from Germany to make the film.