“Oppenheimer” added best original score with a win for composer Ludwig Goransson, while “Barbie” won its only Oscar when Billie Eilish and Finneas O’Connell claimed the statuette for best original song for the ballad “What Was I Made For?”
“I had a nightmare about this last night,” Eilish said, breaking down with nervous giggles at the 96th annual Academy Awards on Sunday. “Thank you so much to the academy. I just didn’t think this would happen. I feel so incredibly lucky and honored.
“Thank you, Greta; I love you,” she said to “Barbie” director Greta Gerwig. “This goes out to everyone who was affected by how wonderful it was.”
The song was the second Oscar for the siblings Eilish and O’Connell, who previously won for “No Time To Die” from the James Bond film of the same name.
“I want to thank my best friend Zoe for playing Barbies with me growing up,” Eilish said. “I want to thank my choir teachers Miss Brigham, for believing in me; Miss Teague, who didn’t like me but you were good at your job.”
Eilish and O’Connell won the Oscar for their song from “Barbie,” but Ryan Gosling won the audience inside the Dolby Theatre his live performance of “I’m Just Ken” from the movie.
Gosling started singing from his seat in the audience, slipped his black cowboy hat onto his castmate Margot Robbie’s head, and ran onto the stage dressed in what looked like a hot-pink bedazzled suit with hot-pink leather gloves. Surrounded by a troupe of tuxedo-clad Kens, including Simu Liu, who played one of the Kens in the movie, Gosling and the rest worked through an elaborate choreography.
At one point, Slash showed up for a guitar solo. Gosling ran back into the crowd to offer the microphone to Robbie, “Barbie” writer-director Gerta Gerwig, and America Ferrara, a nominee for best supporting actress for her part in “Barbie,” before everything wrapped up amid the biggest cheers and applause of the night so far.