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Black stars grab honours at SAG awards

Leading Male Actor was of course Leonardo DiCaprio for “The Revenant”; the Golden Globe victor and everyone’s favourite to finally win an Oscar this year.

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Given that the SAG Award nominations are decided upon by the SAG-AFTRA (essentially, a pool of working actors-about 2,200 people selected at random who are only allowed to serve every eight years), chances are a little higher that the voting group is going to be a much better representation of those people now working in Hollywood.

As the row over the lack of diversity in the Oscar nominations rumbles on, black actors took top honours at the 22nd Screen Actors Guild Awards on Saturday night.

However, director Spike Lee, actress Jada Pinkett Smith and her husband Will Smith announced they would not be attending next month’s awards. – Alicia Vikander, supporting actress victor for The Danish Girl.

“I’m truly humbled by this because it comes from all of you, my fellow actors”, he said in his speech.

As the number of diverse wins continued to rise, Elba acknowledged the triumph, saying, “Welcome to diverse TV” as he introduced best ensemble nominee Beasts of No Nation alongside his costar Abraham Attah.

Queen Latifah wasn’t the only big victor of the night.

The only series category to see a new victor was comedy actor.

Several black performers were honoured including Queen Latifah who was named Best Actress in a TV Movie or Mini-Series for “Bessie“.

Idris Elba took home two awards, celebrating his first win as best supporting actor for Netflix’s Beasts of No Nation, in which he plays an African warlord.

Uzo Aduba was awarded best actress in a comedy series for her role on Netflix’s “Orange is the New Black“, which also nabbed the award for best performance by an ensemble cast in a comedy series.

Brie Larson accepts the award for outstanding female actor in a leading role for “Room” at the 22nd annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. The cast of “Downton Abbey” won best outstanding performance by an ensemble in a drama series.

Jeffrey Tambor won best comedy series actor for playing Maura Pfefferman, an aging wealthy transgender woman in Amazon’s “Transparent“.

Elba, who became the first actor since Helen Mirren in 2007 to pick up two SAG awards in one night-the second was for his role in the TV show Luther-was not the only star to remark upon the diversity of the small screen.

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Here is the complete list of 2016 SAG Award winners.

Best actor for the role at the Screen Actors Guild Awards went to Leonardo DiCaprio. The Oscar-nominated star and environmentalist spoke backstage about facing brutal unpredictable weather while filming'The Revenant and a passion project about climate