Michelle Yeoh's Best Actress win at the 95th Academy Awards made Oscars history, but it also proved that the Academy must do more. Yeoh's performance in the multiverse-hopping comedy-drama Everything Everywhere All at Once triumphed over a group of equally talented women: Cate Blanchett for Tár, Ana de Armas for Blonde, Michelle Williams for The Fabelmans, and Andrea Riseborough for To Leslie. Yeoh's win is highly notable not just because of the quality of her performance but also for the historical precedent it set. Michelle Yeoh winning Best Actress was extremely important, and hopefully, this is the start of the Academy doing more.
Yeoh has had an impressive career, acquiring fame in the 1990s after starring in a series of Hong Kong films where she performed her own stunt work. After moving to the United States, Yeoh portrayed Bond girl Wai Lin, a fan-favorite, in the 1997 film Tomorrow Never Dies. She also gained recognition for starring in Ang Lee's 2000 film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, which received a Best Picture nomination and won Best Foreign Language Film, among other awards. After over 40 years in the acting industry, including a scene-stealing performance in Crazy Rich Asians, Yeoh finally received the ultimate reward with her Best Actress win.
Michelle Yeoh Is The First Asian Woman To Win Best Actress
Michelle Yeoh's Oscar win is historic because she is the first Asian woman to win the Academy Award for Best Actress. The Malaysian-born Yeoh, who plays Evelyn Wang in Everything Everywhere All at Once, is only the second Asian woman nominated for that category. The first was Merle Oberon in 1936 for her performance in The Dark Angel, though she kept her South Asian heritage a secret. On the other hand, Yeoh has been very outspoken about what recognition for her performance in EEAAO means to her as an Asian woman. It's exciting to see Yeoh have her moment in Hollywood and be recognized for her talents.
Yeoh s a small but important club of Asian performers who have won Oscars, which started with Miyoshi Umeki's 1958 Best ing Actress Oscar for her role in the wartime romantic drama Sayonara. ing Actress wins like Umeki's, or Yoon Yuh-Jung's 2021 award for her role in Best Picture candidate Minari are important, but to see an Asian actress be recognized for a lead performance is especially exciting. To win an award the same night as Ke Huy Quan, who won Best ing Actor after struggling to find work for decades, is very poignant and meaningful, proving that representation truly matters in media.
Yeoh’s Win Proves That The Oscars Still Have Work To Do
While Yeoh's win is exciting, it also proves that the Academy still has work to do regarding diversity and representation. Michelle Yeoh is only the second woman of color to win Best Actress, after fellow Bond girl Halle Berry in 2002 for Monster's Ball. The fact that it took 74 years to get a Best Actress winner who wasn't white is ludicrous, and it's also unbelievable that it took 21 years for a second woman of color to win. There are many talented actresses of color who have either gotten snubbed for a nomination or, if they do get nominated, end up losing to a white actress.
Michelle Yeoh winning is a good sign, but as Yeoh herself said in an interview (via Deadline), "But we have to keep at it. We mustn’t take our foot off the pedal.” There is still a need for the Academy to properly recognize performers of color during the Oscars. This is not to detract from the talented performance of white actors and actresses, but many people of color deserve to get their due. Hopefully, Michelle Yeoh's Oscar 2023 Best Actress win surprise is a first step for the Academy in learning to acknowledge more performers of color and is a sign of more diverse award shows in the future.
