Demi Moore in ‘Shock’ After Surprise Golden Globes Win: ‘I Was a Popcorn Actress’

This is what happens when, unlike in the movie, you actually respect The Substance.

Demi Moore won her first Golden Globe Sunday night in the Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy category, for her work in the outrageous, showbiz-skewering horror-comedy The Substance. But as she revealed in her gorgeous, teary speech, Moore’s first major acting recognition didn’t come because of an illicit cocktail. It came after decades of dutifully, bravely pushing boundaries, and a sensational, explosive performance in what turned out to be the best role of her career.

“I’m just in shock right now,” Moore said as she gazed out at the ballroom, including her category’s nominees Amy Adams (Nightb----), Cynthia Erivo (Wicked), Karla Sofia Gascón (Emilia Pérez), Mikey Madison (Anora), and Zendaya (Challengers). “I’ve been doing this for 45 years, and this is the first time I’ve ever won anything as an actor.”

With award-season favorites like Erivo and Madison in the mix, Moore’s win could be considered a surprise in the category. But her work in The Substance has won universal acclaim and Moore has been a fixture on the campaign trail. Most notably, if you watch the Hollywood Reporter Actress Roundtable she participated in with Madison, Zendaya, Angelina Jolie, Zoe Saldaña, and Tilda Swinton, you’ll see them in rapture with Moore as they fawn over her performance.

The Substance and Moore’s singular work in it, particularly as the film careens towards its gloriously cuckoo finale, has some of the loudest buzz in the industry right now, picking up steam at just the right time for Moore’s awards chances.

In The Substance, she plays an actress whose career has washed up as she’s aged, hitting a new low when she’s let go from her last gig as a popular fitness instructor because the company wants younger, fresher talent. She’s then offered and begins taking a black-market drug called “The Substance,” which creates a younger, more vivacious version of herself that she can split time on Earth with—but only works if both she and the younger version (played by Margaret Qualley) honor that trade-off.

It’s lacerating, grotesque commentary on how the entertainment industry—and so many other arenas—dismiss women as they age, and the psychological toll that the desperation to stay young, beautiful, and relevant can have on a person. As such, Moore’s win for this project in particular is especially poignant, which she outlined beautifully in her acceptance speech.

Thirty years ago, she said, a producer told her she was a “popcorn actress.”

“At that time, I made that mean that this wasn’t something that I was allowed to have,” she said, clutching her Globe trophy. “I bought in and I believed that. That corroded more over time, so I thought a few years ago that maybe this was it. Maybe I was complete. Maybe I had done what I was supposed to be.”

But then she got the script for The Substance and the opportunity to star in it: “The universe told me that you are not done.”

She ended her speech with a message about what she’s learned from this experience, on behalf of all people who have “those moments when we don’t think we’re smart enough, or pretty enough, or skinny enough, or successful enough, or basically just not enough.”

The lesson: “I had a woman say to me, ‘Just know, you will never be enough, but you can know the value of your worth if you just put down the measuring stick.’”