‘Best Supporting Actor’ Oscar 2023 Winner: Ke Huy Quan wins award for ‘Everything Everywhere All at Once’

Ke Huy Quan has won the Oscar for ‘Best Supporting Actor’ at the 95th Academy Awards, beating out the likes of Barry Keoghan, Brendan Gleeson and Brian Tyree Henry.

Accepting the award with an emotional speech, the actor stated: “Mom, I just won Oscar! My journey started on a boat. I spent a year in a refugee camp. And somehow, I ended up here on Hollywood’s biggest stage. They say stories like this only happen in the movies. I cannot believe it’s happening to me. This — this is the American dream!”

Starring in Everything Everywhere All at Once alongside Michelle Yeoh and Jamie Lee Curtis, the movie is a multidimensional parenting story about a mother and a daughter attempting to reconnect through time and space. It all starts when Evelyn (Yeoh) and her husband Waymond (Quan), who own a city laundromat, are taken in for a serious meeting about their financial situation by Curtis’ Deirdre.

Speaking about the movie in our philosophical analysis, we stated: “Through embracing nihilism, Daniels have created a film that is difficult to ridicule, despite it containing many divisive moments of comedy. Of course, not every viewer will be on board with the film’s eccentric sense of humour. The directors spend a lot of time exploring a world in which everyone has hot dogs for fingers, as well as an alternate universe that features ‘Raccacoonie’, a racoon version of Pixar’s rodent chef in Ratatouille”.

“To cry nonsense at such moments is a subjective complaint, but it is also to miss the point of the film entirely. Refusing to deny nihilism outright, Everything Everywhere All at Once argues that the feeling of worthlessness and apathy that comes with the philosophical concept can be combatted by embracing absurdity, losing your ego and finding empathy in this shared mortal connection”.

Ke Huy Quan joins the long list of esteemed recent Oscar winners, including CODA’s Troy Kotsur, Judas and the Black Messiah’s Daniel Kaluuya and Once Upon a time in Hollywood’s Brad Pitt. These contemporary greats join a host of iconic supporting actors, including Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, Robin Williams, Tommy Lee Jones and Joe Pesci, who have each claimed awards for the same category in the past.

How Ke Huy Quan won the Oscar for ‘Best Supporting Actor’

Though Ke Huy Quan stars in one of the most important movies of 2022, the actor is most certainly better known for the films he starred in as a young child, appearing in the Steven Spielberg adventure movie Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom as well as Richard Donner The Goonies. Following the release of these two 1980s classics, Ke Huy Quan became an icon of Hollywood cinema but then slowly disappeared from focus.

Aside from two minor appearances in Tales from the Crypt in 1991 and California Man in 1992, Ke Huy Quan took a step back from acting as he entered the 21st century, choosing a career behind the camera instead. He would return to the craft that made him famous in 2021, appearing in the 2021 Netflix film Finding ‘Ohana before taking on the role of Waymond in Everything, Everywhere All at Once.

His return to acting and his subsequent Oscar nomination led him to become a sure bet to take home the Academy Award, with his story reflecting a classic Hollywood redemption arc.

The win for Ke Huy Quan marks one of the most significant moments at the 95th Academy Awards, which have been made memorable after a number of surprising wins. Take a look at the trailer for Everything Everywhere All at Once below, in which Ke Huy Quan stars.