At the 2017 Screen Actors Guild Awards last night, the ensemble of Netflix’s smash sci-fi series Stranger Things surprised everyone by getting recognized for their show and not a viral video of Millie Bobby Brown. What riled viewers up wasn’t the award, however, but the speech by co-star David Harbour (who plays policeman Jim Hopper). Harbour joined several of the night’s guests in speaking out against President Donald Trump’s immigration ban, spitting his words with the fervor of three Demogorgons. He said, in part:
“[T]his award from you, who take your craft seriously, and earnestly believe, like me, that great acting can change the world, is a call to arms for our fellow craftsmen and women to go deeper and, through our art, to battle against fear, self-centeredness and exclusivity of our predominantly narcissistic culture and through our craft to cultivate a more empathetic and understanding society by revealing intimate truths that serve as a forceful reminder to folks that when they feel broken and afraid and tired, they are not alone.”
It was a stirring speech that had fellow attendees up on their feet, but nobody was as struck as Harbour’s co-star, Winona Ryder, whose stunned face oscillated between a host of seemingly conflicting emotions by the second.
Here, for example, she looks in genuine awe of Harbour’s words until the final moment, when she’s like, “Wait, what?” Or, who knows, maybe Matthew Modine just squeezed her shoulder too hard.
Like most of America, Ryder’s probably just caught in the limbo of having any moment of joy or inspiration tempered by the creeping realization that our country is being violently seized by a gaggle of white nationalists.
Regardless, you can’t say she doesn’t have range.