Best known to audiences as Camilla Parker Bowles in The Crown, and nurse Patsy in Call The Midwife, Emerald Fennell is now being recognised for her writing talents, bagging the Best Original Screenplay award for Promising Young Woman.
It is the latest in a string of successes for first-time director Emerald, who was the first woman in 13 years to pick up the award.
Emerald filmed the movie in just 23 days, three weeks before giving birth to her first son in 2019. She is also currently expecting her second child with advertising executive partner Chris Vernon, and was glowing last night as she debuted her blossoming baby bump at the socially-distanced Oscars ceremony.
Promising Young Woman is a revenge thriller starring Carey Mulligan as Cassie, a barista who feels unfulfilled in her life.
The film has so far had huge success this awards season, bagging two gongs at the WGA awards and a further two at this month's BAFTA Film Awards.
First-time director Emerald became the first British woman to be nominated for Best Director with Promising Young Woman, last month.
She didn't prepare a speech for the win, and apologised for the ceremony's director Stephen Soderberg for not being prepared.
She said: 'They said write a speech and I didn’t because I didn’t think this would happen, I’m going to be in trouble with Stephen Soderbergh, I’m so sorry...
'The only speech I ever wrote was when I was 10 - it mainly thanks Morris from 'Saved by the Bell'. Unfortunately he hasn’t been as much of my life as I’d hoped.
'I’m trying very hard not to cry, which is very difficult because as an English person, we don’t cry ever.'
Emerald went on: 'I have so many people to thank, I feel mortified that I’m here when it’s not just my job at all.
'I want to thank Carey Mulligan for being not only the most talented person in the world but also the kindest and funniest, the producers for never giving up, the cast and the crew, the greatest in the world, they just made me look good and I’m so grateful.'
Becoming emotional, she concluded: 'Finally, my family, mum, dad, Coco, my husband, Chris… Come on. Our son who did not arrive until a couple of weeks after shooting, thank God, I crossed my legs all the way through. Thank God.
'Stephen – I hope that was alright.'
Emerald previously received two Emmy nods for the second season of Killing Eve, which she was chosen to pen after friend Phoebe Waller-Bridge left to write Bond.
Oscars 2021: the winners
This year’s nominees represented a huge advance in diversity, with more women and more actors of colour nominated than ever before.
Nomadland swept the Oscars with wins for best film, as well as bagging awards for director Chloe Zhao and its lead Frances McDormand picking up the award for best actress.
Chloe Zhao, who was born in China, is the first woman from an ethnically diverse background to win the Academy Award for directing, and the second woman in history, after Kathryn Bigelow's triumph 11 years ago for The Hurt Locker.
In a surprise victory, Sir Anthony Hopkins won his second best actor award for his lead role in the dementia drama The Father (which also won best adapted screenplay) although he did not appear at the ceremony in person or by video link.
Sir Anthony's win came as somewhat of a shock, with Chadwick Boseman widely tipped to win posthumously for his role in Ma Rainey's Black Bottom - one of his final films before his death.
Elsewhere, Daniel Kaluuya was named best supporting actor for his role as Black Panther leader Fred Hampton in Judas And The Black Messiah, which also won best original song, giving the film two wins in LA.
Sound Of Metal, starring Briton Riz Ahmed as a punk drummer who loses his hearing, also took home two awards - for sound design and editing.
Also scoring two trophies apiece was Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, for make up and costume design, Mank, for cinematography and production design and Soul, which won best animation and best score.
Best supporting actress went to 73-year-old Youn Yuh-jung, who played Soon-ja in Minari - a film about a Korean family trying to make it as farmers in 1980s America.
She paid tribute to the other women in her category, declaring she "doesn't believe in competition" and questioned how she won over fellow nominee Glenn Close (who has so far been nominated for eight Oscars but has never won).
Unusually, most of the films nominated have not had cinema releases and have instead been placed onto streaming services such as Sky, Netflix and Amazon, in what has been a bumpy year for the film industry.
But it seems the Academy Awards were able to make it work despite the additional challenges from this unprecedented year, with international hubs for those who were unable to travel to LA due to Covid restrictions.
Prizes this year were mainly dished out from Los Angeles' Union Station rather than its normal home of the Dolby Theatre. And while guests were not required to wear face coverings while on camera at the ceremony, they were asked to use them when they weren't on screen.
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