Imitation Game Writer Graham Moore's Emotional Oscar Speech: I Didn't Plan It

The Imitation Game screenwriter talked about trying to commit suicide when he was 16

Graham Moore wasn't exactly planning on talking about his suicide attempt when he won the Oscar last night for Best Adapted Screenplay for The Imitation Game.

"I didn't write anything out," he told me at the Governors Ball as his mom beamed by his side while holding his Oscar. "Everyone when they're growing up imagines giving an awards speech. I've given my fair of speeches into the shampoo bottle and into combs over the years."

"This sort of felt like the thing I always wanted to say and I never thought in my life I'd actually be on a stage and say it," he said.

And we are so glad you did.

"Here's the thing," Moore said during his speech. "Alan Turing never got to stand on a stage like this and look out at all of these disconcertingly attractive faces. I do! And that's the most unfair thing I've ever heard."

"So in this brief time here, what I wanted to do was say this: 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. And now I'm standing here...and so I would like this moment to be for this 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 are standing on this stage, please pass the same message to the next person who comes along. Thank you so much!"

The first person to give Moore a hug when he returned to his seat was Imitation star Keira Knightley followed by an even longer embrace from her co-star Benedict Cumberbatch.

"My favorite part of the show was Graham Moore winning," Knightley told me at the Governors Ball. Oprah Winfrey, who presented Moore with the Oscar, also said his speech was one of the most memorable moments of the night.

Moore explained in the press room that he has battled with depression since he was in high school. "I'm not gay, but I've never talked publicly about depression before or any of that, and that was so much of what the movie was about and it was one of the things that drew me to Alan Turing so much," he said (via The Huffington Post). "I think we all feel like weirdoes for different reasons. Alan had his share of them and I had my own and that's what always moved me so much about his story."