Council flat boy who left mum blushing
THRILLED Daniel Kaluuya thanked his mother for his meteoric rise from a London council estate to his night of Oscars glory.
The Judas And The Black Messiah star, 32, who was named best supporting actor, praised Damalie, who ‘gave me your factory settings so I can stand at my fullest height’.
Watching the ceremony in London, she cringed along with her daughter as he quipped during his speech: ‘My mum met my dad. They had sex ... it’s amazing ... I’m here! I’m so happy to be alive.’
Kaluuya was raised in a council flat in Camden, north London. He has told of being unjustly arrested as a youth and being so poor that he would snack on free ketchup sachets from fast food outlets.
He got into acting after it was suggested to his mother that he might benefit from going to classes at the Anna Scher theatre in Islington when he was nine.
His father had disappeared when he was a baby. Kaluuya, whose family has Ugandan roots, has previously talked about fights and knife crime after going to a ‘rough school’.
He wrote his first play at the age of nine, which was performed at Hampstead Theatre. He later landed roles in Skins, Black Mirror and horror film Get Out which made him a star.
On Oscars night he talked of the inspiring example of Black Panther leader Fred Hampton who he plays in Judas And The Black Messiah. Hampton was murdered in his bed by the FBI in 1969.
He said: ‘What a man! How blessed we are that we lived in a lifetime where he existed.’
Hollywood star Samuel L Jackson had criticised the casting of an Englishman as an African-American character. But Kaluuya hit back: ‘I was working class, I had to fight for this and I had to out-work everyone in order to get anywhere and anything.’