Oscars 2020: Marriage Story star Laura Dern pays heartfelt tribute to parents

‘This is the best birthday present ever’, said Dern, after thanking her family and collaborators

Laura Dern has won Best Supporting Actress at this year’s Oscars.

The 53-year-old actress won her first Oscar for her performance in the Netflix-produced divorce drama Marriage Story.

Accepting the award from Mahershala Ali, Dern thanked the cast and crew, saying: ”Noah [Baumbach] wrote a movie about love, and about breaching divisions in the name and in the honour of family and home and hopefully for all of us in the name of our planet.”

Paying tribute to her children and her parents, Dern said: “I share this with my acting heroes, my legends, Diane Ladd and Bruce Dern. You got game. I love you. Thank you all for this gift.”

In Marriage Story, Dern played Nora Fanshaw, the cynical, smooth-talking divorce attorney hired by Scarlett Johansson’s character.

This was the Jurassic Park star’s first Oscar win. She had previously been nominated for Best Actress in 1992, for Rambling Rose, and for Best Supporting Actress in 2015 for Wild.

Also nominated in the category were Florence Pugh for Little Women, Kathy Bates for Richard Jewell, Scarlett Johansson for Jojo Rabbit and Margot Robbie for Bombshell.

South Korean black comedy Parasite was the evening’s biggest winner, making history by becoming the first ever foreign language film to win Best Picture.

Other winners at the 2020 ceremony included Brad Pitt, who delivered an emotional acceptance speech that saw him praise Leonardo DiCaprio and criticise the verdict of Trump’s impeachment trial, while Laura Dern took home the prize for Best Supporting Actress.

As expected, Joaquin Phoenix won Best Actor for Joker following which he criticised inequality and paid tribute to his brother River Phoenix, who died in 1993.

Meanwhile, Olivia Colman had the audience in stitches before presenting Phoenix with his award.

Find a full list of the 2020 Oscar winners here.