Teyana Taylor was a ray of fresh air throughout this year's awards season, and Sunday night's Oscars were no exception. The actress, nominated for her performance as the revolutionary force Perfidia Beverly Hills in Paul Thomas Anderson's Best Picture winner One Battle After Another, has been making waves throughout the entire press circuit. But during the Academy Awards, a ceremony that often feels entirely too stuffy, she maintained her high energy, providing a delightful contrast. Her reactions were so eye-catching and infectious that the Oscars would have benefited from setting up a Teyana Cam for those of us who wanted a dedicated feed of the best moments of the night.
Despite not being in the spotlight, the Oscar-nominated actress didn't let that stop her from enjoying the festivities. From hooting and hollering for her industry friends to showering her director with love, here are some of Taylor's best moments from Sunday night's Oscars:
When Amy Madigan won the Best Supporting Actress award, Taylor was the first to stand, demonstrating true camaraderie. Madigan later explained that she had been alone for most of the awards campaign (Best Supporting Actress is the only category in which Weapons was nominated), and the cast members of other big films had welcomed her. Taylor's actions throughout the night drew some negative retorts from fans online, but in response to one particular naysayer on X, she tweeted: "The world holds so much misery that miserable hearts forget the face of happiness. They grow comfortable being sore losers, so when they see real sportsmanship it unsettles them! Like holy water touching a demon."
Earlier in the broadcast, a Slate colleague of mine had wondered about an object Taylor was holding in her hand. Knowing that Huntr/x, Ejae, Audrey Nuna, and Rei Ami still had yet to perform their Oscar-winning song "Golden" from the Oscar-winning animated film K-Pop Demon Hunters, I had hoped that it was a K-pop lightstick. Come to find out that my joking assumption was exactly right. When Huntr/x took the stage to perform "Golden," the audience was awash with the glow of Hollywood's leading ladies and gents waving their lightsticks in the air. One of them was Taylor, who clapped with it, funnily slapping the lightstick after the performance. This is expected behavior of a mom whose kids love K-Pop Demon Hunters—a true fan, if you will.
When Michael B. Jordan won the Best Actor award for his work portraying the Smokestack twins in Sinners, the room erupted into a much-deserved standing ovation. However, no one seemed to be as thrilled for Jordan as Taylor, who leaped out of her seat and began jumping up and down with joy as Jordan took the stage for his acceptance speech—paying no mind to the fact that she was seated next to her One Battle After Another co-star Leonardo DiCaprio, who had just lost the award to Jordan. (Not that DiCaprio seemed anything but happy for Jordan: He stood up almost as quickly as Taylor did, and the two "competitors" were later photographed sharing a long, emotional embrace.) Before Jordan spoke any words, the cameras caught Taylor clapping with fervor and shouting an emphatic "Yes!" and "Let's go!," capturing the elation that many viewers felt even if most of the stars in attendance weren't showing it.
During a moment of downtime, Teyana was filmed dancing in her seat to Beyoncé's "Crazy in Love" as it played over the loudspeaker. She was tapping her toes to the beat and snapping with one hand while looking at her phone with the other. Even when the show was on an ad break and she was scrolling her phone, she somehow kept the energy going.
When One Battle After Another won Best Picture, Taylor gleefully ran up to the stage with Anderson, excitedly putting him in a headlock (so enthusiastically she almost tripped over her dress), while Anderson just smiled and laughed. She went on to hug everyone else onstage and jump up and down with fellow co-star Chase Infiniti while the OBAA crew was arriving on stage. Later, in an interview with Variety, Taylor said that she and Anderson have a running inside joke about her being "such a sports girl," and so he "already knew the headlock was coming." No Paul Thomas Andersons were hurt in the making of this viral moment.
