After winning her first Golden Globe for her performance in “Emilia Perez,” Zoe Saldaña is expressing gratitude for the filmmakers who have believed in her over the course of her career spanning 25 years.

In the press room following the awards ceremony, Saldaña shared that she heard from “Avatar” director James Cameron following her big win. “I was sitting in the audience, and I received a message from James Cameron, who’s somewhere in New Zealand right now, cutting ‘Avatar: Fire and Ash.’ And he, after all these years, believes in me. So that, to me, nourishes my desire to continue growing as an artist.”

Cameron was effusive of the actor in an interview for her October Variety cover story: “I’ve worked with Academy Award-winning actors, and there’s nothing that Zoe’s doing that’s of a caliber less than that,” he said. “But because in my film she’s playing a ‘CG character,’ it kind of doesn’t count in some way, which makes no sense to me whatsoever. She can go from regal to, in two nanoseconds, utterly feral. The woman is ferocious. She is a freaking lioness.”

Saldaña has long been a box office star, leading the three highest-grossing films of all time — 2009’s “Avatar” and its 2022 sequel “The Way of Water,” which hold the No. 1 and 3 spots respectively, with 2019’s “Avengers: Endgame” sandwiched in between. This year, though, the “Guardians of the Galaxy” alum has earned a level of critical and awards acclaim she’s never enjoyed before in her career.

“What I feel is actually joy, because there’s a sense of presence. I’ve been in this industry for 25 years,” she said. “I’ve always been employed. I’ve always had good human beings, amazing, undeniably talented filmmakers who believe in me and bet on me and trust me consistently. This recognition is paramount for my continuation as an artist. I’m happy. I’m 46. There was a moment a couple years ago where I was sort of thinking about, ‘Do I go into a homestead and start planting a garden?’ But the truth is, I’m an artist through and through, and I need to create every day. I just don’t know what I’d do.”

Saldaña also took a moment to shout out “Emilia Perez” director Jacques Audiard, adding, “I’m indebted to filmmakers like Jacques Audiard that, after conversations and auditions and promises that I can do something, they really decided to bet on me. And it worked.”

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