Mikey Madison, who played a feisty and tenacious sex worker in the movie “Anora,” won the Oscar for best lead actress.
It was Madison’s first Oscar nomination.
The win was something of an upset; Demi Moore, who has seen a career revival for her dynamic performance as an aging fitness star in “The Substance,” was favored to win her first Oscar for the role.
“Anora” — which went on to win the biggest award of the night: best picture — was directed by Sean Baker and revolves around Madison’s character, known as Ani, as she has a whirlwind romance with a Russian oligarch’s son after meeting him at her strip-club gig.
The role required feats of physicality, both in performing the job of a dancer in a strip club and in fighting back when the oligarch sends his henchmen to force the couple to annul their Las Vegas marriage.
“This is a dream come true — I’m probably going to wake up tomorrow,” Madison said in her acceptance speech, in which she thanked Baker, her family and the movie’s movement consultant, Kennady Schneider, among many others.
Madison also underscored the influence that sex workers had on her performance. To study her character, she read memoirs by sex workers, underlining sections of Andrea Werhun’s “Modern Whore.”
“I also, again, just want to recognize and honor the sex worker community,” Madison said. “I will continue to support and be an ally. All of the incredible people, the women that I’ve had the privilege of meeting from that community has been one of the highlights of this incredible — of this entire incredible experience.”
In preparation for the role, Madison also lived in the Brighton Beach neighborhood of Brooklyn — where much of the movie is set — to practice her accent and visit the kind of clubs that are depicted in the film. She also began to learn Russian — though her delivery did not need to be perfect for the movie — and took pole-dancing lessons. The role involved significant nudity and a number of intimate scenes, which Madison said was never daunting to her: “I was always comfortable, and I also think because Ani was too,” she told The Times.
At 25, Madison is among the youngest actresses to have won the award. She is the same age that Grace Kelly was when she won for the 1954 film “The Country Girl” and that Hilary Swank was when she won for the 1999 film “Boys Don’t Cry.”
Madison had her breakout role as a teenager in the series “Better Things” before catching Baker’s eye as a Manson family member in Quentin Tarantino’s “Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood,” and then the 2022 slasher film “Scream.”
Her performance in “Anora” drew rave reviews. In The Times, the film critic Alissa Wilkinson called Madison “mesmerizing,” writing that the role required her “to go for broke, with elements of slapstick, romance, comedy and tragedy, along with dancing in skimpy or nonexistent clothing and throwing a couple of powerful punches.”
Other nominees in the category included Cynthia Erivo, who starred as Elphaba in the movie-musical “Wicked”; Karla Sofía Gascón, the first openly transgender actress to be nominated for an Academy Award, for her role in “Emilia Pérez”; and Fernanda Torres, a standout in “I’m Still Here,” a drama about a family torn apart by a Brazilian military junta.
“I also just want to recognize the thoughtful, intelligent, beautiful, breathtaking work of my fellow nominees,” Madison said in her acceptance speech. “I’m honored to be recognized alongside all of you.”