Natalie Portman's turn as Jackie Kennedy is one of the buzziest performance of this award season, but Portman just set out to do justice to one of the nation's most iconic first ladies in Jackie.
"I watched a lot of footage of her from that era and also read a lot of the biographies of her," Portman told E!'s Brad Goreski on the red carpet at the 2017 SAG Awards of the research she did for the role, for which she is nominated tonight. "She really led our nation through such a difficult, dark moment in history, and we're so lucky that she really kept us going in a moment where everyone was feeling a lot of fear and a lot of anxiety about what was going on, not dissimilar to our moment right now."
Portman also couldn't help but give a shout out to her castmates in the film, which tells the story of Jackie Kennedy's life after the assassination of her husband, President John F. Kennedy.
"I mean, it's nice to be here celebrating actors because I think with the other actors I was lucky enough to work with—including the late, great John Hurt—it was really always feeling the safety with them, and of course with our director [Pablo Larrain], who really just guided us in such a beautiful way."
Jackie was John Hurt's last film released before his death on Jan. 27. Portman is also nominated for an Oscar for the role, and Jackie is nominated for both costume design and original score this year.