“She called me her daughter”: in video, the tribute of Michelle Williams to the actress who played her grandmother in Dawson

It is a touching tribute that Michelle Williams made on the stage of the 32nd ceremony of the Gotham Awards 2022 in New York this Monday, November 28.

While receiving an interpretation award for her role in Steven Spielberg's

- based on the director's childhood and which will be released in France on February 22, 2023 - the 42-year-old actress gave a strong speech to the glory of Mary Beth Peil, a woman who greatly influenced her in her acting career.

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Mary Beth Peil played the role of Evelyn Ryan, the grandmother of Jen Lindley, a character portrayed by Michelle Williams in the hit series

.

Williams credits her mentor, now 82, with the reason for her success in the industry.

"Every time something good happens to me in my life, I can draw a straight line to someone who was supposed to be here tonight," the actress introduced in a nearly 3-minute speech.

Deploring the absence of the main interested party - we do not know if this one had to face an unforeseen event or was not notified in time - Michelle Williams, who lives in Brooklyn, made a point of apologizing: "to be New -Yorkoise, means living in a reality over which you certainly have no control.

So she's not in the room, but she's in my heart.

The actress then recounted this meeting which would change her life, noting that she was "an emancipated minor" when she appeared on the set of the show stamped Warner Bros: "I was 16 years old and I was totally alone.

Mary Beth Peil was the first artist I met in my life.

She didn't see herself as such, but there was something different about her."

“She showed me that creativity was more than just a profession.

And all that vitality was miraculously turned in my direction.

Her smiling face looked at me and she called me her daughter,” she recalls about the actress.

“She was an opera singer, she was a Tony Award nominee, she was a mother, she went from TV to movies and theater like she was changing trains at rush hour;

she could do everything”, she describes again.

“She told me stories about this place, this fucking New York City, and she said it was a place where I could go and build a life,” she continued. .

Ending her speech, she expressed her gratitude for the recognition she received during the evening: “I would not have been able to manage being the mother of Steven Spielberg [in

, NDLR] without being Mary Beth's granddaughter, so thank you Mary Beth, and thank you, the Gotham Awards for that."

In video, Dawson and Joey, the separation

Dawson

aired for six seasons from 1998 to 2003. The TV series followed the adventures of a group of teenage friends in the fictional seaside town of Capeside, Massachusetts.

Michelle William has since chained roles in Hollywood, nominated four times for the Oscars for

,

,

and

.