The 10 Most Heartwarming Grownup Celebrity Moments of 2022

Brendan Fraser got emotional at the Venice Film Festival premiere of The Whale

After his career got off to a promising start in the 1990s, Brendan Fraser, 54, mostly disappeared from the spotlight, in part because of a series of debilitating on-set injuries, and also because he alleges he was the victim of sexual assault at the hands of a powerful industry player, which nearly made him quit Hollywood altogether. He slowly started returning to the screen in a series of well-received supporting TV and film roles, but this year marks his big comeback. He’s earning major Oscar buzz for his turn as a reclusive and morbidly obese writing professor in 53-year-old Darren Aronofsky’s The Whale. When the wrenching drama premiered at the Venice Film Festival in September, the chronically underrated actor was met with a six-minute standing ovation, and he got visibly emotional at the crowd reception. It’s impossible not to root for the noted good guy, who recently nabbed his first Golden Globe nomination for the role.

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Sheryl Lee Ralph delivered an instantly iconic Emmys acceptance speech

Four decades after her Tony-nominated turn in Broadway’s Dreamgirls, Sheryl Lee Ralph, 65, finally got another juicy role she could sink her teeth into when she was cast as the caring kindergarten teacher Barbara Howard on ABC’s public school–set mockumentary Abbott Elementary. For her work on the inaugural season, she became the first Black actress to win the Primetime Emmy for best supporting actress in a comedy series in 35 years. When her name was announced, the audience leaped to their feet, and when she reached the stage, Ralph belted out Dianne Reeves’ powerful anthem “Endangered Species”: “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 continued, “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.”

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Christina Applegate made her first public appearance since her MS diagnosis

Last year, Emmy-winning actress Christina Applegate, 51, announced via Twitter that she had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, and she didn’t make another public appearance until this November, when her star was unveiled on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Backed by her Married… with Children family Katey Sagal, 68, and David Faustino, 48, and her Dead to Me co-star Linda Cardellini, 47, she tearfully thanked her friends and family members for their support but showed off her trademark wit, joking, “Oh, by the way, I have a disease. Did you not notice? I'm not even wearing shoes! Anyhoo, you're supposed to laugh at that.” She ended on a note of sincere gratitude: “Thank you so much, this is an incredible honor.”

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Kate Bush improbably had the song of the summer

It’s been 37 years since English singer-songwriter Kate Bush, 64, released “Running Up That Hill,” her biggest hit in the United States, which peaked at number 30 on the Billboard Hot 100. All that changed this summer when the song featured prominently in the new season of Netflix’s Stranger Things, skyrocketing it up to number 3 on the charts! The usually media-shy artist agreed to a rare interview with BBC, her first since 2016, and she said of the song’s newfound success, “[Stranger Things] is such a great series, I thought that the track would get some attention. But I just never imagined that it would be anything like this. It’s so exciting. But it’s quite shocking, really, isn’t it? I mean, the whole world’s gone mad.”

Michelle Yeoh finally received the accolades she deserves

The 60-year-old Malaysian-born actress had an incredible year thanks to the unexpected success of the absurdist action-adventure-comedy Everything Everywhere All at Once, which places her on this year’s short list of best actress front-runners. The film sees Yeoh taking on villains in countless parallel universes in increasingly kickass action sequences, but in interviews about the project, she showed off a decidedly more vulnerable side. In one viral clip with GQ, she dabbed tears as she recalled her decision to sign on for the film: “[This] is something I’ve been waiting for, for a long time, that’s going to give me the opportunity to show my fans, my family, my audience what I’m capable of: to be funny, to be real, to be sad. Finally, somebody understood that I can do all these things.” There’s so much unspoken in those tears shed — about her place in Hollywood as an Asian actress and the opportunities missed over the decades — but for now, we can celebrate her victories.

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Celebrities visited Ukraine to show their support

During the unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, many celebrities — including Angelina Jolie, 47, Sean Penn, 62, Liev Schreiber, 55, and Ben Stiller, 57 — made visits to the war-torn nation to volunteer, meet with refugees and shine a spotlight on the conflict. Stiller memorably met with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, 44, telling him, “You’re my hero. What you’ve done and the way that you’ve rallied the country and for the world, it’s really inspiring.” Ukraine-born Mila Kunis, 39, and husband Ashton Kutcher, 44, have raised $37 million and counting on their GoFundMe page, while chef José Andrés, 53, and his World Central Kitchen charity had served more than 150 million meals by September. And Marvel regular Benedict Cumberbatch, 46, proved his superhero bona fides by housing a Ukrainian family in his U.K. house, remarking, “I want to give them some stability after the turmoil that they’ve experienced, and that’s within my home.”

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Joni Mitchell returns to the Newport Folk Festival after health struggles

Since having a brain aneurysm in 2015, the Canadian songstress, 79, has made very few public appearances, and she had to teach herself to walk, sing and play guitar again. She put that hard work to good use with a surprise appearance at July’s Newport Folk Festival in Rhode Island, performing her first full-length public concert in two decades. But this wasn’t some quick cameo: She played a 13-song set, including the hits “A Case of You,” “Big Yellow Taxi” and “Both Sides Now,” complete with a rousing electric guitar solo on “Just Like This Train.” Seated in a throne-like chair and flanked by fellow artists Wynonna Judd, 58, and Brandi Carlile, 41, Mitchell held court as the queen of folk, and her resilience left many in the audience and onstage awestruck and emotional.