Sam Rockwell dedicates Oscar win to Philip Seymour Hoffman

Sam Rockwell won best supporting actor at the 2018 Oscars at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood on Sunday, March 4, for his role as Jason Dixon in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri.

“I’d like to thank the Academy … I never thought I’d say those words,” Rockwell, 49, said when taking the stage, before thanking all of his fellow nominees – Willem Dafoe (The Florida Project), Woody Harrelson (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri), Richard Jenkins (The Shape of Water) and Christopher Plummer(All the Money in the World). Rockwell has swept award seasons thus far, winning the BAFTA Award, the Golden Globe Award and two Screen Actors Guild Awards.

In his speech, he also shared a story of when he was 8 years old and was called to the principal’s office. When his father arrived and said they had to go, he said, “It’s Grandma.” However, once they got in the car, he asked his dad what had happened. “He said, ‘Nothing, we’re going to the movies.’”

He thanked his family for their love of movies and thanked the cast before his “beloved Leslie Bibb.”

“You light my fire baby! I love you,” he told Bibb, 43, before ending his speech. Holding up the Oscar, he said, “For my old buddy, Phil Hoffman.”

The late Philip Seymour Hoffman directed Rockwell in the off-Broadway production of The Last Days of Judas Iscariot. The two remained close friends until Seymour’s untimely death in 2014.