Oscar winner Graham Moore sets record straight about winning speech

IT was one of the most talked about speeches of the night — but the world got one big thing wrong about Oscar winner Graham Moore.

HE got the world talking with his powerful Oscars speech, but it seems the world accidentally outed The Imitation Game’s screenwriter Graham Moore.

Moore picked up the award for Best Adapted Screenplay, and used the opportunity to talk about the struggles of “being different” while growing up.

Mentioning the main character in the movie, English mathematician Alan Turing — who was gay — he said:

“Alan Turing never got to stand on a stage like this and look out on all these disconcertingly attractive faces. And I do. And that’s the most unfair thing I think I’ve ever heard.”

Graham Moore accepts the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for The Imitation Game.

He then went on to discuss his own personal struggles as a teenager, revealing:

“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 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, and then when it’s your turn, and you are the one standing on this stage, please pass this message on.”

Social media lit up with support for Moore.

But many accidentally misinterpreted his comments in support of Turing — who was prosecuted for homosexuality in Britain and died by suicide — to be a celebration of his own homosexuality.

After the Oscars, he clarified his speech, explaining, “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.”

Graham Moore after winning the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.

Originally published as Oscar winner Graham Moore sets record straight about winning speech