Julia Louis-Dreyfus won Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor for Veep at the 2018 SAGs on Sunday, January 21, but the actress, who just completed her last round of chemo for breast cancer, did not attend the show.
Presenters Connie Britton and Mandy Moore accepted the award on her behalf.
“Julia Louis-Dreyfus couldn’t be here this evening,” Britton said. “Julia, we’re thinking of you and we love you and we are happy to accept the Actor on your behalf.”
The cast of Veep also took home the trophy for Best Television Comedy. “I’d like to thank Julia, our leader, who is so unfortunately not here,” Matt Walsh said while accepting the award with the cast of the HBO hit on Sunday.
Louis-Dreyfus took to Twitter to react to her big win: “I wish I could have been @SAGawards tonight but have to admit it’s pretty fun to watch in my pj’s. So honored to win. So proud to be a union member. So happy for my @VeepHBO bozos for winning ensemble award. Miss being at the table with you all. How was the chicken?”
As previously reported, the Seinfeld alum, 56, revealed in September 2017 that she had been diagnosed with breast cancer. “1 in 8 women get breast cancer. Today, I’m the one,” she tweeted at the time. “The good news is that I have the most glorious group of supportive and caring family and friends, and fantastic insurance through my union. The bad news is that not all women are so lucky, so let’s fight all cancers and make universal health care a reality.”
Louis-Dreyfus shared a video on January 11 via Instagram that her sons, Henry and Charlie, recorded for her in honor of her last day of chemotherapy.
“My beauty boys @henryhallmusic @charlie_hall made this for me today, my last day of chemotherapy,” Louis-Dreyfus captioned the clip, in which her boys lip-sync and dance to Michael Jackson’s “Beat It.” She added: “Pretty swell, right? Ain’t they sweet?”
The clip begins with text across the screen that read: “Mom’s Last Chemo Day!!! BEAT IT!!! Love, Henry and Charlie.”
Amid her cancer battle, the actress has been determined to continue working on Veep to the best of her ability, the show’s executive producer Frank Rich said in November. “Julia is undergoing treatment for breast cancer, and we’re obviously postponing production of the show – we were supposed to have started now – while she’s in treatment. But the expectation is that we will shoot again.”
