Zoe Saldaña won the Academy Award for best supporting actress for her performance in the Spanish-language musical “Emilia Pérez.”

She plays Rita, a downtrodden Mexico City lawyer who decides to accept an offer to help Emilia Pérez, a drug cartel boss played by Karla Sofía Gascón, set up a new life after receiving gender-affirming surgery.

Saldaña anchors what many critics pointed to as the film’s standout song, “El Mal,” during which Rita confronts corrupt politicians during a gala. (“El Mal” won the Oscar for best original song.)

“Thank you to the academy for recognizing the quiet heroism and the power in a woman like Rita,” Saldaña said.

In her acceptance speech, Saldaña said her grandmother, who came to the United States from the Dominican Republic in 1961, would be proud of her win.

“The fact that I’m getting an award for a role where I got to sing and speak in Spanish, my grandmother, if she were here, she would be so delighted,” Saldaña said.

The film headed into the ceremony with 13 nominations, the most this year. Its awards buzz was quieted, though, when a journalist resurfaced a series of racist comments posted by Gascón on social media years ago. Gascón apologized but in the wake of the scandal, Netflix refocused its awards campaign on Saldaña’s performance.

She won in a category that included Monica Barbaro for her performance as Joan Baez in “A Complete Unknown”; Ariana Grande as Glinda the Good in “Wicked”; Felicity Jones in the period drama “The Brutalist”; and Isabella Rossellini in the papal election thriller “Conclave.”