Black Panther wins Marvel its first three Oscars

Black Panther is a history-making film in so many ways. In addition to featuring the first black superhero in mainstream comics and breaking box office records in the process, Black Panther also made history at the Academy Awards. Ruth E. Carter’s win for Best Costume Design on Sunday night marked the first time any Marvel Studios film has won an Oscar. She was immediately followed up by Hannah Beachler’s win for Best Production Design, the second Oscar win for any Marvel Studios film. Though Marvel movies like Doctor Strange and Guardians of the Galaxy have been nominated in the past for categories like Best Visual Effects, the studio has never actually taken home the gold until now.

Carter’s and Beachler’s wins aren’t just remarkable for what they do for Marvel, of course. Carter is the first black woman to ever win Best Costume Design. So is Beachler in her category, but not just that — she is the first black person to ever even be nominated for Best Production Design. As a result, Beachler’s joy was infectious during her acceptance speech, as she thanked Black Panther director Ryan Coogler and others.

“I stand here because of this man who offered me a different perspective of life,” Beachler, who was also a production designer on Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight and Beyonce’s Lemonade saga, said about Coogler. After a few more thank-yous, she ended her speech with a piece of advice she once received from “a very wise woman”: “I did my best, and my best was good enough.”

Later, in the press room, Beachler expanded on her praise for Coogler: “There was never any doubt in my mind that I wanted to do the film because I knew what Ryan would do with it and what it would become… not just a superhero film, but a film for the ages.”

Black Panther’s streak continued with Ludwig Göransson’s win for Best Original Score. Earlier this month, the composer talked to EW about crafting a score for a superhero film that also had a star-heavy soundtrack, featuring the likes of Kendrick Lamar and Vince Staples. “In today’s movies, you can’t just have a song play through a whole five-minute scene,” he said. “People don’t really have that patience today. So something that I worked on a lot is, how do you take this song and keep the core and energy, but then make it into more of a score moment where you hit specific moments of the action?”

Later in the night, Avengers: Infinity War became the latest Marvel Cinematic Universe film to lose Best Visual Effects (to First Man), and Black Panther lost Best Picture to Green Book. Despite losing the big one, Sunday still ended up being a pretty big night for Marvel Studios.

Related content:

• Oscars 2019: See the full list of winners
• Oscars 2019: See all the stars on the red carpet
• Here are the history-making wins from the 2019 Oscars