Black Panther won big at last night's SAG Awards, and the cast's acceptance speech was both epic and powerful.
The movie won a huge gong at the prestigious 25th Screen Actors Guild Awards, scooping 'Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture'.
Advert
Also nominated for the top film prize alongside Ryan Coogler's superhero flick was A Star Is Born, BlacKkKlansman, Bohemian Rhapsody, and Crazy Rich Asians.
As the winner of the award was announced, Chadwick Boseman, Danai Gurira, Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong'o, Angela Bassett, Winston Duke and more piled onto the stage to accept the prize in front of the audience.
Chadwick, who portrays T'Challa/Black Panther, made the acceptance speech on behalf of the cast, celebrating what it means to be 'young, gifted and black' by quoting a Nina Simone song.
Advert
He said: "When I think of going to work every day and the passion and the intelligence, the resolve, the discipline that everybody showed, I also think of two questions that we all have received during the course of multiple publicity runs.
"One is: Did we know that this movie was going to receive this kind of response? Meaning, was it going to make a billion dollars? Was it going to still be around during this awards season?
"The second question is: Has it changed the industry? Has it actually changed the way this industry works [and] how it sees us? And my answer to that is, 'To be young, gifted, and black'."
Advert
Chadwick continued his speech by reflecting on what the cast wanted to create with the film, calling on their own personal experiences.
The actor explained: "We know what it's like to be told there's not a screen for you to be featured on, a stage for you to be featured on. We know what it's like to be the tail, but not the head.
"We know what it's like to be beneath, but not above. And that is what we went to work with every day. Because we knew not that we would be around during awards season or that it would make a billion dollars, but we knew that we had something special that we wanted to give the world - that we could be full human beings in the roles that we were playing.
"That we could create a world that exemplified a world that we wanted to see."
Advert
Chadwick closed their speech by teasing a planned Black Panther sequel to the audience, adding: "I know you can't have a Black Panther now without a '2' on it."
Since hitting cinema screens, Black Panther has challenged representation in blockbusters, changing the landscape for those who are "young, gifted and black".
Featured Image Credit: PA ImagesTopics: Celebrity Entertainment, TV Entertainment