Jared Leto is now Oscar winner Jared Leto after claiming the Academy Award for best supporting actor. Leto has always been considered the favorite for the Oscar, given his stunning turn as Rayon alongside Matthew McConaughey in Dallas Buyers Club.

Jared Leto Dallas Buyers ClubJared Leto [L] and Matthew McConaughey [R] in 'Dallas Buyers Club'

However, Leto had faced stiff competition in the form of Michael Fassbender and Barkhad Abdi, though it was the 42-year-old actor-turned-musician-turned-actor who deservedly took home the prize.

Taking to the stage, Leto – who arrived at the ceremony with his mother – told the audience, “To my fellow nominee's I am so proud to share with journey with you and I'm in awe and I have so much respect for you all.”

He then paid trubute to his mother, pointing out she brought him up as a "high scholl drop out and a single mother," but noted she "managed to make a better life for herself and her children, she encouraged her kids to be creative to work hard and to do something special...I just want to say I love you mom and thankyou for teaching me to dream." 

The '30 Seconds To Mars' frontman concluded his speech by stating, "to all the dreamers out there watching this tonight in places like the Ukraine and Venezuela, as you struggle to make your dreams happen, and live the impossible, we're thinking of you tonight."

In Dallas Buyers, Leto played a HIV-positive transgender woman, towards whom Matthew McConuaghey’s character Ron Woodruff is initially hostile. However, the pair become unlikely friends and begin running a buyers club for HIV patients to purchase unapproved but potentially useful drugs.

Leto apparently stayed in character throughout the 25 day shoot.

“That phrase ‘staying in character’ to me really means commitment, focus, and for a role like this that’s so intense and challenging and extreme in a lot of ways, it demanded my full attention,” Leto told the New York Times. “I couldn’t imagine every time the director yelled ‘Action!’ that I would recall all of the aspects, the physical and emotional characteristics of the character, at a moment’s notice.

Watch our interview with Dallas Buyers Club: