Ke Huy Quan wins Oscar for best supporting actor for ‘Everything Everywhere’

Ke Huy Quan accepts the Academy Award for best supporting actor for Everything Everywhere All at Once at the 95th Annual Academy Awards at Dolby Theatre on March 12, 2023 in Hollywood, Calif.

Kevin Winter/Getty Images

hide caption

toggle caption

Kevin Winter/Getty Images

Ke Huy Quan accepts the Academy Award for best supporting actor for Everything Everywhere All at Once at the 95th Annual Academy Awards at Dolby Theatre on March 12, 2023 in Hollywood, Calif.

Kevin Winter/Getty Images

Ke Huy Quan capped off a glorious awards season run on Sunday evening by winning the Oscar for best actor in a supporting role for Everything Everywhere All at Once.

In an emotional speech, Quan acknowledged the long road to his first Oscar win, stretching back even before his career as a child actor.

“My journey started on a boat,” Quan said. “I spent a year in a refugee camp. And somehow, I ended up here.”

The win hardly comes as a surprise. For his role as Waymond, a meek husband who guides his distant wife through the zany contours of the multiverse, Quan has been showered with numerous accolades, including the Screen Actors Guild and Gotham awards.

The role in Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert’s sci-fi/fantasy epic has served as a formidable and beloved comeback for the performer, who first rose to prominence as a child star in movies like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and The Goonies. As a young adult, however, the opportunities dried up – until, decades later, he landed upon Everything Everywhere All at Once.

Quan is only the second Asian performer to win the Oscar for actor in a supporting role after Haing S. Ngor for The Killing Fields in 1985.