"If I may: Call your mom, everybody. I'm told there's like a billion people or so [watching]. Call your mom, call your dad, if you're lucky enough to have a parent or two alive on this planet, call them. Don't text, don't email, call them on the phone. Tell them you love them, and thank them, and listen to them for as long as they want to talk to you. " said best supporting actor winner for Whiplash J.K. Simmons before thanking his own parents.
The director of foreign-language film winner Ida said, "We made a film, black and white, about the need for silence and withdrawal from the world and contemplation, and here we are at this epicenter of noise and all the tension — fantastic, life is full of surprises!"
"We're only little, and they're heavy to us," said The Phone Call's Mat Kirkby and James Lucas upon winning the live-action short honor. Now with a victory, "I can get a free donut at my local bakery. … Short films are made with tenacity, and lots of favors — can't do without them."
"To every woman who gave birth, to every taxpayer and citizen of this nation, we have fought for everybody else's equal rights," said best supporting actress winner for Boyhood Patricia Arquette. "It's our time to have wage equality once and for all, and equal rights for women in the United States of America."
"Once upon a time, there was a freckled-face little boy who told his mom and his dad that one day, he was gonna work at Walt Disney Animation," said Big Hero 6 director Don Hall upon winning best animated feature. "And they did something amazing: They supported him and they believed him. And from the bottom of his heart, he thanks them."
"The disclosures that Edward Snowden reveals don't only expose a threat to our privacy but to our democracy itself," said Citizenfour director Laura Poitras upon winning the best documentary honor. "When the most important decisions being made affecting all of us are made in secret, we lose our ability to check the powers that control. Thank you to Edward Snowden for his courage and for the many other whistleblowers."
"This bridge [referring to the onstage replica of Selma, Alabama's Edmund Pettus Bridge] was once a landmark of a divided nation but now is a symbol for change," said Common upon winning the original song Oscar. "The spirit of this bridge transcends race, gender, religion, sexual orientation and social status. The spirit of this bridge connects the kid from the South Side of Chicago, dreaming of a better life to those in France standing up for their freedom of expression, to the people in Hong Kong protesting for democracy. This bridge was built on hope, welded with compassion and elevated by love for all human beings."
Legend added, "Selma is now because the struggle for justice is right now. We know the Voting Rights Act that they fought for 50 years ago is being compromised right now in this country today. We know that right now, the struggle for freedom and justice is real. We live in the most incarcerated country in the world. There are more black men under correctional control today than were under slavery in 1850. When people are marching with our song, we want to tell you we are with you, we see you, we love you, and march on."
"When I was 16 years old, I tried to kill myself because I felt weird and I felt different and I felt like I did not belong," said the winning Imitation Game screenwriter. "And now I'm standing here. So I would like for this moment to be for that kid out there who feels like she's weird or she's different or she doesn't fit in anywhere: Yes you do. I promise you do. Stay weird, stay different, and then when it's your turn and you're standing on this stage, please pass the same message to the next person who comes along."
"I am fully aware that I am a lucky, lucky man. This Oscar — wow! — this belongs to all of those people around the world battling ALS," said best actor winner Eddie Redmayne — who portrayed physicist Stephen Hawking, who suffers from ALS, in The Theory of Everything — pausing to stare at the statue in his hand. "I will be its custodian, and I promise you I will look after him, I will polish him, I will answer his beck and call, I will wait on him hand and foot."
"I read an article that said that winning an Oscar can make you live five years longer, and if that's true, then I'd like to thank the Academy because my husband is younger than me!" said best actress winner Julianne Moore of Still Alice. "One of the wonderful things about movies is that it makes us feel seen and not alone, and people with Alzheimer's deserve to be seen so that we can find a cure."
"Oh my God, they want me to talk because I'm the worst English-speaking guy here?" said best picture helmer Alejandro G. Inarritu. "Maybe next year the government will inflict some immigration rules to the Academy? Two Mexicans in a row — that's suspicious, I guess." He dedicated the award to those in Mexico: "I pray that we can find and build the government that we deserve. And the ones that live in this country, who are part of the latest generation of immigrants in this country, I just pray that they can be treated with the same dignity and respect of the ones who came before and built this incredible immigrant nation."