Lashana Lynch Thanked Women In Her Powerful Acceptance Speech

Presented by Lady Gaga and the category’s previous winner Bukky Bakray, Lashana Lynch took home the Rising Star award at the 2022 BAFTA Awards. Accepting the award from Bakray, the No Time To Die star took the opportunity to thank her “very supportive parents” who came to Britain from Jamaica and were part of the Windrush Generation. “I have to thank them for my existence”, she said.

Lynch continued acknowledging her “working-class foundation” which taught her everything she “needed to know about failure, about ‘no’s and what ‘no’s mean, and about how to celebrate your yeses. Now I get to celebrate the ‘yes’ that I never expected,” the actor said.

Wanting to “pay homage to classic cinema and the women that paved the way for me”, Lynch wore a black Prada off-the-shoulder gown to the event. “Doing it in a moment like this makes me really proud of where I’ve come from and where we’re going,” the star told British Vogue. Lynch’s hair and makeup were inspired by “the greats such as Dorothy Dandridge, Eartha Kitt, and Josephine Baker,” as Lynch’s hairstylist Junior Green and make-up artist Alex Babsky said. “I hope their spirits will be on the red carpet today!”

The James Bond star went on to thank “the women of this country who taught me what it is to be in the industry as a dark skinned woman,” specifically “Doña Croll, Carmen Munroe, a whole list of others” who Lynch thanks “for laying the foundation for people like me.” Backstage, Lynch said she planned on giving her award to her mother because she didn’t “know what to do with it.”

Previously speaking to Bustle, Lynch said she was “well aware” of what her casting in No Time to Die meant for the James Bond franchise and the entertainment industry. “As soon as I take [the focus] away from me, it becomes we,” she said. “That’s the most important thing for women, young women, and my culture. That’s before I even take the role.” She went on to say that the next generation needs to be “reminded that what they were born with enables them to be capable of every single thing under the sun.”