Cancel the Oscars, Glenn Close just brought her dog up to accept her Film Independent Spirit Award

It’s time, once again, for the second-biggest awards show of whatever weekend the Oscars happen to be on—third, if you’re a big fan of the Razzies—as the Film Independent Spirit Awards kicked off in Los Angeles just a few minutes ago. The only awards show in Hollywood that would never even think to threaten its audience with a popular movies category, the Spirit Awards are the cool, outsider-y take on the usual hoi and/or polloi awards show buzz, something made very clear in this year’s cold open sequence, in which host Aubrey Plaza ritually murders “virgin sacrifice” Finn Wolfhard while Brian Tyree Henry looks on.

Featuring appearances from Marisa Tomei, Marcia Gay Harden, Cristina Ricci, and other luminaries of the less-than-limelight, it’s a super out-there, very weird bit to open a big Hollywood awards show with, and we have to tip our hat to Plaza—who joked in her monologue that she got the gig because the original choice, “nobody,” was booked for tomorrow night—for going extremely on-brand with its opening moments.

Not that it was all gold daggers and eviscerated Stranger Things stars, though; we’ve also already seen some really touching speeches to accompany all the bloodshed, including an emotional turn from supporting actor winner Richard E. Grant, who dedicated his win for Can You Ever Forgive Me? to Ian Charleston, the man who inspired his character in the film and died of AIDS at 40, and “to that generation of men that were wiped out by that disease.”

We’ve also seen comedian-turned-directorial darling Bo Burnham pick up the award for Best First Screenplay for Eighth Grade—thanking his star, Elsie Fisher, and calling worker with her, “ the single greatest creative experience of my life.” Another winner in the Firsts category: Boots Riley, whose fantastic sci-fi satire Sorry To Bother You won Best First Feature. True to form, Riley used his platform as a new winner to speak out against U.S. involvement in Venezuela.

Update: It’s now several awards later, and Glenn Close just brought her dog Pippi up to accept her Best Female Lead award for The Wife. Broke: The Oscars in their entirety. Woke: Glenn Close, Glenn Close’s dog Pippi, and the Film Independent Spirit Awards.