‘Birdman’ tops SAG awards

The backstage farce “Birdman” topped the 21st annual Screen Actors Guild Awards, winning best ensemble cast, even though its star, Michael Keaton, was upset by Eddie Redmayne in the most outstanding actor category.

Oscar favorites Julianne Moore, Patricia Arquette and J.K. Simmons cemented their front-runner status in a ceremony that often serves as a kind of preview to the Academy Awards.

Redmayne, who stars as Stephen Hawking in “The Theory of Everything,” was the somewhat surprise winner in a category expected to go to Keaton for his career-capping performance as a Hollywood has-been trying to mount a comeback on Broadway. Redmayne dedicated his award – “this very wonderful skinny man” – to sufferers and victims of ALS.

Moore, widely considered the best-actress favorite, won most supporting actress for “Still Alice,” in which she plays an academic with early onset Alzheimer’s Disease.

Accepting the award for most outstanding supporting actor for his performance as a domineering jazz teacher in “Whiplash,” Simmons thanked all 49 actors who appear in the drama.

“Boyhood” star Patricia Arquette added the latest in a string of awards Sunday, taking the supporting actress honor for her performance, filmed over the course of 12 years.

“I can’t tell you what this means to me,” said Arquette. “I’m a fourth-generation actor. My family has been committed to acting for over a century, through feast or famine.”

Sunday’s show kicked things off with a pair of wins for the Netflix prison series “Orange Is the New Black,” honoring it as best ensemble in a comedy and naming Uzo Aduba most outstanding actress in a comedy series.

Best ensemble cast in a drama series went to “Downton Abbey,” the second time the series has won the category.

On Saturday night, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s “Birdman” took the top award from the Producers Guild Awards, it may be formidable competition to the perceived front-runner, Richard Linklater’s “Boyhood.” The last seven PGA winners have also won best picture at the Academy Awards.

Because actors make up the largest portion of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, the SAG Awards are also considered one of the most telling Oscar previews. Two actors who usually reside on the big screen won the SAG awards for performances in a miniseries or TV movie: Mark Ruffalo (for HBO’s “A Normal Heart”) and Frances McDormand (for HBO’s “Olive Kitteridge”). Kevin Spacey (“House of Cards”), William H. Macy (“Shameless”) and Viola Davis (“How to Get Away With Murder”) also collected awards.

Debbie Reynolds, the “Singin’ in the Rain” star, was honored with the SAG lifetime achievement award, which her daughter, Carrie Fischer, presented.