Very Demi Moore, very mind-blowing: New Mexico native wins first major career award with Golden Globe

Demi Moore had a golden night on Sunday.

The 62-year-old actress picked up a Golden Globe — her first major career award — for her role in “The Substance.”

The Roswell native has been in the limelight since the mid-1980s and early 1990s with her work in movies such as “St. Elmo’s Fire,” “Ghost,” “A Few Good Men,” “Indecent Proposal,” “The Scarlet Letter” and “G.I. Jane” — even becoming the highest paid actress in the mid-1990s. (Moore was paid $12.5 million for 1996’s “Striptease”).

Moore’s win for best actress in a musical or comedy category has given her momentum and she is considered a serious threat for the Academy Award for best actress.

“The Substance” is written, directed, co-edited and co-produced by Coralie Fargeat.

It follows a fading celebrity, Elisabeth Sparkle, played by Moore, who after being fired due to her age by her producer, who is played by Dennis Quaid, uses a black market drug that creates a much younger version of herself, played by Margaret Qualley, with unexpected side effects.

Moore was surprised by the win and gave an emotional acceptance speech that resonated with many in the room.

“This is the first time I’ve ever won anything as an actor,” Moore said as she reflected on 45 years in the film industry. “I’m just so humbled and so grateful.”

Moore then told the audience a personal story from early in her career.

“Thirty years ago I had a producer tell me that I was a popcorn actress, and at that time, I made that mean that this wasn’t something I was allowed to have,” she said. “That I could do movies that were successful, that made a lot of money, but that I couldn’t be acknowledged. I bought in and I believed that. That corroded me over time to the point where I thought a few years ago, that maybe this was it, maybe I was complete, maybe I’ve done what I’m supposed to do.”

Then a few years ago, there was a turning point in her career and in her thinking when the script for “The Substance” crossed her path.

“As I was at kinda a low point, I had this a magical, bold, courageous, out of the box, absolutely bonkers script come across my desk called ‘The Substance,’” she said. “The universe told me that you’re not done. I’m so grateful to Coralie for trusting me to step in and play this woman, for Margaret for being the other half of me that I couldn’t have done without.”

Moore left the audience with closing remarks.

“I think (what) this movie is imparting is in those moments when we don’t think we’re smart enough or pretty enough or skinny enough or successful enough, or basically just not enough,” Moore said. “I had a woman say to me, ‘Just know you will never be enough, but you can know the value of your worth if you just put down the measuring stick.’ So today, I celebrate this as a marker of my wholeness, and of the love that is driving me and for the gift of doing something I love and being reminded that I do belong.”

Moore was born in Roswell and lived there until her teen years before moving to Los Angeles where her career began in the 1980s.

During the 82nd Golden Globes broadcast on Sunday, Brady Corbet’s 215-minute postwar epic “The Brutalist” and Jacques Audiard’s Spanish language, genre-shifting trans musical “Emilia Perez” won top honors.

The Globes, which are still finding their footing after years of scandal and makeover, scattered awards around to a number of films. But the awards group put its strongest support behind a pair of movies that sought to defy easy categorization.

“The Brutalist” was crowned best film, drama, putting one of 2024’s most ambitious films on course to be a major contender at the Academy Awards. The film, shot in VistaVision and released with an intermission, also won best director for Corbet and best actor for Adrien Brody. In his acceptance speech, Corbet spoke about filmmakers needing approval on the final cut.

“I was told that this film was un-distributable,” said Corbet. “No one was asking for a three-and-half-hour film about a mid-century designer in 70mm. But it works.”

“Emilia Pérez” won best film, comedy or musical, elevating the Oscar chances of Netflix’s top contender. It also won best supporting actress for Zoe Saldaña, best song (“El Mal”) and best non-English language film. Audiard, the French director, made way for Karla Sofía Gascón, the film’s transgender star who plays a Mexican drug lord who undergoes gender-affirming surgery, to speak on behalf of the film.

“The light always wins over darkness,” said Gascón, gesturing to her brightly orange dress. “You can maybe put us in jail. You can beat us up. But you never can take away our soul or existence or identity.”

Best actress, in a drama film, was an even bigger surprise.

The Brazilian actress Fernanda Torres won for her performance in “I’m Still Here,” a based-on-a-true-story drama about a family living through the disappearance of political dissident Rubens Paiva in 1970s Rio de Janeiro. Torres dedicated the award to her mother, the great actor Fernanda Montenegro, who appears in “I’m Still Here,” too.

“She was here 25 years ago,” said Torres. “And this is like proof that art can endure through life even through difficult moments.”

Best supporting actor in a musical or comedy went to Sebastian Stan for “A Different Man,” in which Stan plays a man with a deformed face who’s healed. Stan, who was also nominated for playing Donald Trump in “The Apprentice,” noted that both films were hard to get made.

“These are tough subject matters but these films are real and they’re necessary,” said Stan. “But we can’t be afraid and look away.”

The Associated Press contributed to this story.