We’ve gotten so used to hearing the term snatched via the likes of RuPaul’s Drag Race that it’s quite possible to have forgotten its original meaning: to quickly seize something in a rude or eager way. We got a lesson in that olde-worlde meaning last month at the Grammys, what with the fallout from Taylor Swift accepting her album-of-the-year award (the first artist to win the album award four times and just one of her six honors that night). Celine Dion (looking major in Valentino) was doing the presenting duties, and when Swift excitedly appeared onstage, it seemed that she reached for that gramophone statuette with nary a hello or thank-you to Dion—without so much as even acknowledging her very presence.
Clips started to pour forth on social media, as did the commentary. I happened to be flicking through IG Stories and saw that someone had posted: “Snatched that Grammy from Celine like a purse on Canal Street omg.” Not to stir a lukewarm—or perhaps stone-cold—pot, but if there was a feud brewing post–award show (somebody tell Ryan Murphy), it was going to be an awfully short-lived one: Dion and Swift looked mighty pally and all smiles later that night.
Yet still: The moment in which you accept an award can provide so many, many more moments—and never more so, of course, than during the Academy Awards. (Just Google “Sally Field” or “Jack Palance” or “Gwyneth Paltrow” with “Academy Awards.”) We thought it might be fun, as this Sunday night approaches, to look at the etiquette of accepting an award. You’d think the rules would be simple—be polite, speedy, and remember to say thank you—and they are, but simple might go out the window when you’re up onstage in front of your peers with a gazillion people watching at home.
Nian Fish—whose long career in fashion has included producing shows for Marc Jacobs, Tom Ford, Jil Sander, Helmut Lang, and Phoebe Philo in her Chloé era and whose creative direction turned the CFDA Awards into something cutting edge—says it all starts with the brevity of the speech. It might be all about you, but like so many aspects of etiquette, it’s really about how you’re socially navigating the moment.
Her first rule, created for the CFDAs: To be respectful of everyone’s time and attention, keep it short. “It should be about a minute or a minute and a half,” she says. “Any longer and you lose them—and it can start to sound narcissistic.” (Speaking for too long can also mess up the running time of the event and cut the time for others to get their chance to speak and have their moment in the spotlight. After all, the speech is meant to be a heartfelt acknowledgment—not a lecture.)
Fish’s second rule: “I tell people to practice their speech with a speech coach because you’re not an actor—and it’s okay that you’re not an actor. At the Oscars, they’re pros: They know how to read off a teleprompter, and they know how to engage the room. Otherwise, most people are terrified up there. So practice.” And her third: “Write your speech from the heart, keep it authentic, and show gratitude—gratitude, gratitude, gratitude.” Fish’s three favorite award-acceptance moments came from Donna Karan, Ralph Lauren, and Calvin Klein. “They were all extremely grateful,” she says. “They thanked their teams. The gratitude was clear. And the personal stories were brief. They’re pros.”
When it comes to something like the Tonys, meanwhile, Jordan Roth—the American theater producer whose career has yielded as many Broadway hits as his wardrobe has delivered fashion moments—insists that being gracious onstage shouldn’t preclude saying something meaningful. “The acceptance speech is a unique opportunity to say something that matters,” he says. “Know that the next generation is watching you, dreaming of being where you are at this very moment. Give them your wisdom, your heart, your encouragement. An acceptance speech is not a time to redress the wrongs of your critics or past snubs. You won—don’t diminish your moment.”
And for Roth, those undiminished moments can mean uniting the awardees and the audience in profound ways: It’s the politesse of making everyone in the room feel like they’re seen and heard. Ask which acceptance speeches Roth remembers from the Tonys for their graciousness and meaning, and he responds: “Marc Shaiman and Scott Whitman’s epic kiss [in 2003] when they won for writing the score of Hairspray (long before same-sex kissing was anywhere on network TV) and Michael Arden’s thrilling defiance of childhood bullies in solidarity with trans, nonbinary, and queer youth [from 2023] are two of my favorite Tony moments with a capital M! And I will always remember, when I was a kid, watching on TV as 11-year-old Daisy Eagan won a Tony Award [in 1991] and just bawled for the first minute of her speech. Sometimes the best speeches have no words at all.”
But you have to have some words. A few days after Fish and I chatted, she kindly texted a follow-up. “Breathe,” she wrote. “Make eye contact. Tell a short personal anecdote. Convey emotion—funny, tears, joy.” And just to drive the point home, she repeated one more time: “Gratitude, gratitude, gratitude.”
When it comes to the etiquette of accepting an award, has everyone got that now?