LOS ANGELES (AP) – Emma Stone sang and danced her way to a best-actress Oscar for “La La Land,” elevating the once struggling actress with roots in community theater to the heights of Hollywood.
Stone’s victory on Sunday night was the sixth Oscar earned by the musical set against a Los Angeles backdrop. It had a leading 14 nominations.
She portrayed an aspiring actress forced to endure the indignities of failed auditions and working in a studio cafe before getting a nudge from a struggling jazz pianist played by Ryan Gosling.
Stone experienced similar things in her own career that began in her hometown of Scottsdale, Arizona. She dropped out of high school and gave her parents a PowerPoint presentation to convince them to let her move to Los Angeles to pursue acting.
Once there, she endured starts and stops before breaking through in 2010 with the teen comedy “Easy A.”