Calgary producer, animators and dancer among those who represented the city at the 2023 Oscars

Calgary in the spotlight on Oscar night Nicole Di Donato speaks with a number of Calgarians whose lifelong efforts brought them to the stage at the 95th Academy Awards.

Calgary was well-represented at the 95th Academy Awards on Sunday night.

Three Calgarians were nominated for awards and another showed their dance skills on stage during a musical performance.

ODESSA RAE

Calgary-born Odessa Rae says she will never forget the moment Questlove announced Navalny as the Academy Award winner for best documentary feature film.

“You’re kind of in shock, and so, you just sort of take it in, try and breathe, move through it, and it’s over very quickly, but it doesn’t feel like it up there,” she told CTV News from her hotel room in Los Angeles, California.

“It’s extraordinary, really magical.”

Rae worked as one of the producers on the film, alongside Diane Becker, Melanie Miller and Shane Boris.

“It’s really quite heavy and it got a little bit dirty from all the partying last night I think,” she said, holding up her engraved Oscar.

Directed by Toronto-based filmmaker Daniel Roher, Navalny details the 2020 assassination attempt of Russian opposition leader and former presidential candidate, Alexei Navalny.

The win came with a message about Navalny, who survived poisoning with a lethal nerve agent only to get locked up behind bars.

“Our speech was not necessarily to thank the friends and family that helped get us here, and there are so many of them, but more about Alexei’s message, trying to bring global attention to getting him out of prison, you know, getting him free,” Rae said, adding they also felt it was important to give Navalny’s wife Yulia a chance to speak.

“He’s in prison for telling the truth, and like he says in our film, don’t be an active. It’s now no longer the time to stay silent.”

Rae says most of her family still lives in Calgary and held watch parties Sunday night to honour her.

AMANDA FORBIS AND WENDY TILBY

Calgary-based animators Amanda Forbis and Wendy Tilby were at the Academy Awards for their nominated short film The Flying Sailor.

It’s the true story of a sailor who survived after being blasted two kilometres into the air when two ships collided in the Halifax Harbour during the First World War.

“We were pretty calm about it all, but then when your category comes up, your palms get sweaty,” Forbis said.

This is the third project they’ve worked on together and their third time being nominated for an Oscar as a duo.

“It was just fun hanging out with our peeps, you know, our National Film Board people were there, Luigi Allemano, our composer, flew in from Montreal,” Tilby said.

Tilby says one of the best parts of being at the Oscars is getting to people-watch.

“It is controlled chaos. The whole thing feels like it’s teetering on the edge of some disaster because everybody’s standing up and going in and out and then they count down to when the show is resuming and everybody suddenly is quiet and sitting in the nick of time,” she said, laughing.

Back home in Calgary, friends and supporters gathered at Cold Garden in Inglewood to cheer them on.

“They are amazingly talented and I really want people to know just how hard they’ve worked,” said their friend Corinne Dickson, who was at the watch party.

The party featured cupcakes with ship anchors on them and a life-size cutout of the sailor from the film for people to take pictures with.

The Flying Sailor lost to The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse, but they still feel like they won.

“It’s just been really so touching the kind of things that people have done for us,” Forbis said. “Calgary has an enthusiasm and they just really get behind you and it’s lovely.”

BILLY MUSTAPHA

Calgary-born dancer Billy Mustapha was one of two leads in the live performance of “Naatu Naatu” from the Indian film RRR.

The track won best original song at the Academy Awards, making history as the first song from an Indian film to be nominated, and win, in the category.

“It was the most insane experience in my whole life. That stage, the audience, the lights, the cameras, everything, it was magnifying,” he said.

Mustapha has been dancing since he was seven years old and has worked on various movies, television shows and music videos, but says this is the largest stage he’s ever performed on.

He says rehearsals only lasted five days.

“To learn all the moves, to learn all the spacing, and then make the changes, and on top of that, learn lyrics in a language I don’t speak,” he said. “So, it was probably one of the most challenging and rewarding jobs I’ve ever got to experience.”

Mustapha now lives in Los Angeles but says his family and friends back in Calgary have been extremely supportive.

“I’ve received so many phone calls and text messages. I grew up dancing at Dance Spectrum in Calgary and my teachers are so proud, the students there and my fellow dancers that I used to dance with are so proud of me,” he said. “I’m just so grateful for the community I have behind me, lifting me up right now.”

IMPACT ON CALGARY

Luke Azevedo, vice president, creative industries, operations and film commissioner for Calgary Economic Development, says the Calgary representation at the Academy Awards is important on many fronts.

“I think this has not only an impact on the global marketplace, as they see Calgary as a location of choice for production moving forward, but also to our local folks here in the province, knowing that that talent that’s on that stage is representing this city, this province and the importance of this industry as we move forward.”

Azevedo adds that this helps build on the province’s long legacy in the film and television industry.

“It sure does showcase the quality of talent that’s coming out of this city,” he said. “Not everybody knows that we have 100 years of history here in this province in film and television and there’s been many awards and accolades at the global level.”