Jennifer Coolidge is a great sayer of things. She said “soup†in the most important way possible in Best in Show.
When she said, “These gays are trying to murder me†in The White Lotus finale, it instantly inspired an iconic club remix. And now, she has recited an awards speech that is already part of the “audition monologue†canon. At the 2023 Golden Globes, Coolidge won the award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Limited Series/Anthology or Motion Picture for her role as Tanya in HBO’s White Lotus. While the Emmys shooed her off with play-off music and a vaudeville hook after her win for the same role, people like Michelle Yeoh and Austin Butler scared the Globes enough that by the time Coolidge won, she had plenty of time onstage. So enjoy her completely unfiltered and extremely well-delivered speech that made Mike White cry:
“Thank you, thank you so much, wow, and thank you, Hollywood Foreign Press. It really means a lot. Thank you. Wow. I can put this down, right? I don’t work out, you know what I mean — I can’t hold it that long. But, you know, this is such a great night. I’m so glad to be here and be in the company of all of you. Hollywood Foreign Press, thank you. I just want to say, some of the people in this room, there were like five people that kept me going for, you know, 20 years with these little jobs. And Ryan Murphy, you were one of them. It’s these little jobs that kept me going, it was like five — it was like you, Ryan, and, let’s see, we got — who else was there. It was … just you, Ryan.
[Laughter] No, but, I mean — I didn’t know anybody, and it just was sort of this thing that wasn’t going anywhere. Then there were these people who would give me these cute little jobs and it would just be enough to get to the next one. Michael Patrick King, you kept me going for a long time, and Reese [Witherspoon], you got me in Legally Blonde. And then the Weiss brothers would keep me going because some of these would go like five different episodes, and five different sequels of American Pie. I’ve milked that to death. I’m still going for six or seven, whatever they want.
But I just want to say, I hope my agent at UTA and Tiffany [Kuzon], you all forgive me because the hook came out at the last thing I got an award at, this giant hook, and I thought it left when vaudeville ended, and this hook came and took me off the stage at the Emmys. And I didn’t get to say what I really wanted to say at the Emmys, which is Mike White … I just — truly, I just want you all to know that I had such big dreams and expectations as a younger person, but what happened is they get sort of fizzled by life and whatever. I thought I was going to be Queen of Monaco even though someone else did it. [Laughter] But I had these giant ideas. And then you get older and, oh, shit’s going to happen. And, Mike White, you have given me hope. You’ve given me a new beginning. Even if this is the end, because you did kill me off, but even if this is the end, you changed my life in a million different ways. My neighbors are speaking to me and things like that. I was never invited to one party on my hill, and now everyone’s inviting me! I just — you know, it’s to you, Mike White.
This is something all of you, if you don’t know Mike White, this is what you should know: He is worried about the world, he’s worried about people, he’s worried about friends of his that aren’t doing well, he’s always worried about people, you’re worried about animals, and he really is one of the greatest people I’ve ever … He gives me so much excitement to be — you make people want to live longer, and I didn’t. [Laughter]
So anyway, I just want to say, Mike White, I love you to death. I just want to say, this is a real fun night, thank you. Thank you!â€