Why Foxx gave away his Oscar statue

Jamie Foxx has revealed he refused to take home the Oscar he won in 2005.

Foxx won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in Ray (he was also nominated that year for Best Supporting Actor for Collateral).

Speaking to Jerry Seinfeld in Netflix’s Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, Foxx said he was worried about the effect the award would have on his ego.

“When I win the Oscar, I don’t take the Oscar home,” Foxx explained to Seinfeld. “I give it to my manager.

“I said, because if I take that, I’ll buy into the Oscar sh*t and I won’t be funny anymore. For whatever reason, when I was holding that Oscar I automatically started to speak in an English accent,” he joked.
 

Foxx, who started out in showbiz as a comedian, has previously revealed he didn’t take his Oscar nominations seriously in the lead-up to the event until Oprah Winfrey staged an intervention.

“I took (Oscar season) as an excuse to party,” Foxx said at the 2018 Tribeca Film Festival. “I was like, ‘Oh, I’m nominated? Break out the champagne and let’s party’. I remember going absolutely nuts.

“I went to the Golden Globes and there was champagne involved and I was just wrong on the red carpet. I was disrespectful to the process.”

After being scolded by his publicist, Foxx received a call from Oprah who told him he was blowing his chance to win.

“Oprah told me, ‘You really have a great chance to do something that is wonderful, and the character you played touched so many people, but not if you act like this’,” Foxx recalled.

The talk show queen then arranged a gathering of legendary black actors to meet with Foxx at Quincy Jones’ house.
 

“Standing in a tuxedo in the corner was Sidney Poitier,” Foxx said. “I walked up to him and he said, ‘I watched your performance and I grew two inches. I leave you with one thing: responsibility’.”

Foxx broke down in tears after meeting Poitier, who was the first African-American to win an Oscar for Best Actor.

“To this day, it’s the most significant time in my life,” Foxx said.