Eddie Redmayne, Julianne Moore Reverse Oscars’ Trend of Rewarding Older Actors, Young Actresses

The “Savage Grace” co-stars were each honored Sunday night for “Still Alice” and “The Theory of Everything”

When Eddie Redmayne and Julianne Moore won Oscars for Best Actor and Best Actress on Sunday night, it reversed the typical Academy trend of rewarding young female ingenues while celebrating older male actors.

“The Theory of Everything” star Redmayne beat out elder statesman Michael Keaton as well as Bradley Cooper Steve Carell and fellow Brit sensation Benedict Cumberbatch.

At age 33, Redmayne becomes the youngest Best Actor winner of at least the past 10 years, which have seen Matthew McConaughey, Daniel Day-Lewis, Jean Dujardin, Colin Firth, Jeff Bridges, Sean Penn, Forest Whitaker, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Jamie Foxx take the podium.

Meanwhile, recent Best Actress winners include Jennifer Lawrence, Natalie Portman, Marion Cotillard and Reese Witherspoon, all of whom were under 35 years old when they won their first Oscars.

Moore won at age 54 on her fifth nomination, after going home empty-handed for “Boogie Nights,” “The End of the Affair,” “The Hours” and “Far from Heaven.”

The average age of this year’s four acting winners was 48 years and 3 months old, as supporting winners J.K. Simmons and Patricia Arquette are 60 years old and 46 years old, respectively.

Moore and Redmayne previously shared the screen as an incestuous mother and son in the 2008 drama “Savage Grace.”

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