Jordan Peele Makes History at 2018 Oscars With Best Original Screenplay Win for Get Out

Jordan Peele took home the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay at the 90th Annual Academy Awards on Sunday for Get Out and he made history in the process

By Tierney Bricker Mar 05, 2018 3:55 AMTags
Watch: Daniel Kaluuya Dishes on "Get Out" Oscar Nomination

GTFO!

Jordan Peele is officially an Oscar winner! The director, writer and producer of Get Out won the award for Best Original Screenplay at the 2018 Oscars on Sunday, with the audience going wild when his name was called by Nicole Kidman

"This means so much to me, I stopped writing this movie about 20 times because I thought it was impossible," Peele said. "I thought it wasn't going to work. I thought no one would ever make this movie, but I kept coming back to it because I knew if someone would let me make this movie that people would hear it and people would see it." 

Peele's win was a historic one, as he is the first black screenwriter to win an Oscar for best original screenplay in the show's 90-year history. "I want to dedicate this to everyone who let me raise my voice," he said. 

Peele also went on to thank his wife, Chelsea Peretti, and his mom, "who taught me to love even in the face of hate." 

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Peele beat out Emily V. Gordon and Kumail Nanjiani (The Big Sick), Greta Gerwig (Lady Bird), Guillermo del Toro and Vanessa Taylor (The Shape of Water), and Martin McDonagh (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri) to win the award.

Get Out is almost nominated for  Best Picture, Best Lead Actor for Daniel Kaluuya, and Best Director for Peele. 

Peele is just the third person in 90 years to be nominated for directing, writing and producing his first film. 

After his win, Peele took to Twitter to express his surprise. 

"To the cast and crew, I love you. Thank you so much," Peele said during his time on stage, and before the start of the ceremony, Peele's cast had nothing but love for their leader when they talked to E! News

"It's a lot of things," star Lil Rel Howery said. "It's hard to really put Get Out in a genre. It has everything included in it, and that's brilliant. Jordan was writing this movie for what, eight years?" 

Bradley Whitford told Ryan Seacrest of the script, "I walked out of the room and I said to my fiancee, this is unlike any script I've ever read. This could be incredibly brilliant or it could really not work."