He also deployed the ocean. At the SAG Awards, he spoke of Charlie as being on “a raft of regrets” in “a sea of hope” — an image that doubled as his own, since the character’s situation and his own biography had been in conversation throughout the making of the film. At the Critics Choice ceremony, there was the “dark sea” reference for those who felt lost in their own lives. The nautical imagery — the sailing and floating and being adrift, and the finding of something solid — ran through his public language in ways that suggested a genuine metaphorical register for how he had experienced the years away.
He also acknowledged, with the plainness that characterized most of what he said in public contexts throughout the awards run, that the road back had been real in its difficulty. He did not pretend the quiet years were easy. He did not pretend, either, that they were only suffering. He spoke about the TV work without embarrassment. He spoke about Doom Patrol and the pleasure of voice work. He maintained that he had continued, that the work had continued, that the thread of the career had not broken even when its public visibility had contracted.
The quote that perhaps best encapsulates the specific quality of his framing is the one from E! News, simple and clean: “I’ve never been that far away. But I’m happy to be here now.”
## Killers of the Flower Moon and After: The New Career Chapter
The Oscar ceremony was not the end of the story. It was the formal recognition of a return that, in practical terms, was already well underway.