Watch Sheryl Lee Ralph sing her thrilling Emmys 2022 acceptance speech

Sheryl Lee Ralph seemed stunned herself when she pulled off an upset victory, winning the best-supporting-actress-in-a-comedy award at the Emmys 2022 for her work on Abbott Elementary.

But that didn’t stop her from seizing the moment in inimitable style. Singing her acceptance speech, the Tony nominee for the original production of Dreamgirls quoted the Dianne Reeves song “Endangered Species” and sang, “I am an endangered species, but I sing no victim’s song / I am a woman, I am an artist, and I know where my voice belongs.”

She already had the room on their feet – obviously! – but continued with the spoken part of her speech, and may have gotten even more inspiring. 

“To anyone who has ever, ever had a dream and thought your dream wasn’t, wouldn’t, couldn’t come true, I am here to tell you that this is what believing looks like,” Ralph said. “This is what striving looks like, and don’t you ever, ever give up on you. Because if you get a Quinta Brunson in your corner, if you get a husband like mine in your corner, if you get children like mine in your corner, and if you got friends like everybody who voted for me, cheered for me, loved me, thank you, thank you, thank you.”

On the show Ralph plays Barbara Howard, a veteran teacher who has earned the admiration of her colleagues, particularly Brunson’s striving Janine. Ralph has said that the success of Abbott, a true Cinderella story in an era when network TV comedies seemed to be on their way out, has already been a victory: “Whether I get that trophy in my hand or not, I already feel like a winner,” she told NPR. “The love that has been shown to me, showered on me, the flowers that have been given to me, literally and figuratively. I feel like a winner. And forever after this, I will always be Tony-nominated, Emmy-nominated Sheryl Lee Ralph. Oh, my God! I feel so good and so happy and so excited.”