'Birdman,' 'Orange,' Moore among winners

LOS ANGELES - The backstage farce

Birdman

topped the 21st annual Screen Actors Guild Awards, winning best ensemble cast, even though its star, Michael Keaton, was upset by Eddie Redmayne in the most outstanding-actor category.

Keaton led the Birdman cast, including Emma Stone, Edward Norton, and Zach Galifianakis, in accepting the top honor from the acting guild, calling the profession "the ultimate team sport."

"Every time I turned around, I ran into another tremendous actor," said Keaton.

Oscar favorites Julianne Moore, Patricia Arquette, and J.K. Simmons cemented their front-runner status in a ceremony that often serves as a kind of preview to the Academy Awards. But Redmayne's win for his performance as Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything was a slight surprise, especially since Keaton's performance as an egotistical, paranoid Hollywood has-been trying to mount a comeback on Broadway is in many ways an ode to acting.

Redmayne dedicated his SAG award - "this very wonderful skinny man," he said looking down at his blue statuette - to sufferers and victims of ALS.

Moore, widely considered the best-actress favorite, won most outstanding supporting actress for Still Alice, in which she plays an academic with early onset Alzheimer's Disease. Accepting the award, she recalled an early lesson on the soap opera As the World Turns, in which she played twin sisters, good and evil.

"Then I realized it was super boring to act by myself," said Moore.

Accepting the award for most outstanding supporting actor for his performance as a domineering jazz teacher in Whiplash, Simmons thanked all 49 actors who appear in the drama. "All of us actors are supporting actors," said Simmons, a veteran character actor. "Each of us is essential, completely crucial to the story because if there's one false moment, the train comes off the rails."

Boyhood star Patricia Arquette added the latest in a string of awards Sunday, taking the supporting actress honor for her performance, filmed over the course of 12 years. "I can't tell you what this means to me," said Arquette. "I'm a fourth-generation actor. My family has been committed to acting for over a century, through feast or famine."

Because actors make up the largest portion of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, the SAG Awards are also considered one of the most telling Oscar previews. Individually acting winners usually mirror each other exactly, or very nearly. Last year, the top four winners - Matthew McConaughey, Cate Blanchett, Lupita Nyong'o, Jared Leto - all went on to win Academy Awards after getting SAG awards.

Sunday's show kicked things off with a pair of wins for the Netflix prison series Orange Is the New Black, honoring it as best ensemble in a comedy and naming Uza Abuda most outstanding actress in a comedy series. Abuda won over a number of veteran stars, including Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Veep) and Edie Falco (Nurse Jackie).

Best ensemble cast in a drama series went to Downton Abbey.

Movies

Cast: Birdman

Actor: Eddie Redmayne, The Theory of Everything

Actress: Julianne Moore, Still Alice

Supporting Actor: J.K. Simmons, Whiplash

Supporting Actress: Patricia Arquette, Boyhood

Stunt Ensemble: Unbroken

Television

Actor in a movie or miniseries:

Mark Ruffalo, The Normal Heart

Actress in a movie or miniseries: Frances McDormand, Olive Kitteridge

Actor in a drama series:

Kevin Spacey, House Of Cards

Actress in a drama series: Viola Davis, How To Get Away With Murder

Actor in a comedy series:

William H. Macy, Shameless

Actress in a comedy series:

Uzo Aduba, Orange Is The New Black

Drama series cast: Downton Abbey

Comedy series cast:

Orange Is the New Black

Stunt Ensemble: Game Of Thrones EndText