Morgan Freeman
MILLION DOLLAR BABY

ACCEPTANCE SPEECH
I want to thank everybody and anybody who ever had anything at all to do with the making of this picture. But I especially want to thank Clint Eastwood for giving me the opportunity to work with him again. And to work with Hilary Swank. This was a labor of love. And I thank the Academy. I thank you. So very much.



Cate Blanchett
THE AVIATOR

ACCEPTANCE SPEECH
Thank you very much. Thank you to the Academy who know Katharine Hepburn so well and is so intimately acquainted with her work. This is an indescribable surprise and honor. Thank you. I know you think it's cheesy, sweetheart, but I have to thank you, my husband. And Hylda Queally, and Robyn Gardiner, my uber-agents, and the wonderful Lisa Kasteler.

Everyone involved in THE AVIATOR, when you play someone as terrifyingly well-known as Katharine Hepburn, it's a collaborative effort, you need as much help as you can get. And thank you, of course, to Ms. Hepburn. The longevity of her career, I think, is inspiring to everyone.

But most importantly, and on behalf of everyone I know on THE AVIATOR, thank you to Martin Scorsese. I hope my son will marry your daughter.




Hilary Swank
MILLION DOLLAR BABY

ACCEPTANCE SPEECH
I don't know what I did in this life to deserve all this. I'm just a girl from a trailer park who had a dream. I never thought this would ever happen, let alone be nominated. And a working actor, for that matter. And now, this. I thank the Academy. I'm eternally grateful for this great honor. I would also like to acknowledge my fellow nominees, Annette, Imelda, Kate, and Catalina, your work inspires me beyond words.

I am going to start by thanking my husband because I'd like to think I learned from past mistakes. Chad, you're my everything. Thank you for your support. It means the world. I would never be standing here if it weren't for the -- each and every one of the brilliant people I had surrounding me, supporting me and believing in me. Tom Rosenberg, Gary Lucchesi, thank you for sending me this most marvelous script. You will never know how grateful I am. Paul Haggis, for writing this beautiful script. Our other producers extraordinaire: Al Ruddy, Clint, Rob Lorenz. Phyllis Huffman, our casting director. My trainers, Grant Roberts and Hector Roca, you pushed me further than I ever thought I could push myself up to that last pound, actually to that last ounce. I thank you. My sparring partners who were so patient. And everyone at Gleason's.

Well, the ever-amazing Morgan Freeman. Tom Stern, our cinematographer, you are brilliant. Joel Cox, our editor, you're amazing. You know? I'm going to thank my mom for believing in me from the beginning. My dad, for his support. My agents, Josh Lieberman, Tony Lipp, Kelly Tiffan, John Campisi. Jason Weinberg my manager （You can't do that. I haven't gotten to Clint yet! I saved him for the end）

Karl Austen, Jeff Bernstein, my lawyers. And then Clint. Clint Eastwood. Thank you for allowing me to go on this journey with you. Thank you for believing in me. You're my "macushla" Thank you. Warner brothers, as well. And you know what? Wait! Troy Nankin, my best friend and publicist. Thank you!




Jamie Foxx
RAY

ACCEPTANCE SPEECH
I guess we got to do it again. "Oh, Ah!" Yeah, you're ready. That's for Ray Charles. Give it up for Ray Charles and his beautiful legacy. And thank you, Ray Charles, for living.

I got so many people to thank tonight. First I want to start it out with Taylor Hackford. Taylor, you took a chance, man. I mean that love for Ray Charles was deep, down in the earth. It's cracked open. And it's spilling. And everybody's drowning in this love. I thank you for taking a chance on this film. And thank you for waiting 15 years to get me to do it. I want to thank you.

I want to thank Crusader. I want to thank my agents. I want to thank Rick Kurtzman. I want to thank Kim Hodges. I want to thank Steve Smooke. I want to thank my managers, Jaime King and Marcus King. Let's live this African American dream. It's beautiful. I'm glad I'm with you. I ain't never leaving you. I'm glad I'm with you.

I got a chance to meet a whole lot of people, experiencing this. And other people I want to thank, I want to thank my sister. Four feet, eleven inches of nothing but pure love. I want to thank my daughter for telling me just before I got up here, "If you don't win dad, you're still good."

I'm just ... I see Oprah and I see Halle. I just want to say your names. I want to talk to you later. Both of you. Because Oprah got -- allowed me to meet somebody by the name of Sidney Poitier. And, yes, Sidney Poitier said, "I saw you once. And I looked in your eyes and there was a connection." And he says, "I give to you responsibility." So, I'm taking that responsibility tonight. And, thank you, Sidney.

This is probably going to be the toughest part of this speech. My daughter shares my grandmother's name, "Marie." My grandmother's name is Estelle Marie Talley. She's not here tonight. And this is going to be the toughest part. But she was my first acting teacher. She told me to stand up straight. Put your shoulders back. Act like you got some sense.

We would go places. And I would wild out. And she would say, "Act like you've been somewhere." And then when I would act the fool, she would beat me. She would whup me. And she could get an Oscar for the way she whupped me because she was great at it. And after she whipped me, she would talk to me and tell me why she whipped me. She said I want you to be a southern gentleman. She still talks to me now. Only now, she talks to me, in my dreams. And I can't wait to go to sleep tonight because we got a lot to talk about. I love you.





MILLION DOLLAR BABY
Clint Eastwood

ACCEPTANCE SPEECH
Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. I'd like to thank my wife, who is my best pal down here. And my mother, who was here with me in 1993. She was only 84 then. But she's here with me again tonight. And she just -- so, at 96, I'm thanking her for her genes.

It was a wonderful adventure. It takes a -- to make a picture in 37 days, it takes a well-oiled machine. And that well-oiled machine is the crew -- the cast, of course, you've met a lot of them. But there's still Margo and Anthony and Michael and Mike and Jay and everybody else who was so fabulous in this cast. And the crew, Campanelli. Billy Coe and, of course, Tom Stern, who is fantastic. And Henry Bumstead, the great Henry Bumstead who is the head of our crack geriatrics team. And Henry and Jack Taylor, and Dick Goddard, all those guys. Walt and everybody. I can't think of everybody right now.

I'm drawing a blank right now. But, Warren, you were right. And thank you, for your confidence earlier in the evening. I'm just lucky to be here. Lucky to be still working. And I watched Sidney Lumet, who is 80, and I figure, I'm just a kid. I'll just -- I've got a lot of stuff to do yet. So thank you all very much. Appreciate it.