Actor Dev Patel mentioned his humble roots in west London after he accepted his BAFTA award last night (Sunday February 12).
The star was said to be stunned after picking up his best supporting actor gong for his part in Lion, which he co-starred along side Nicole Kidman and Rooney Mara.
The performance of the 26-year-old, from Harrow , has also earned him an Oscar nomination ahead of the glitzy Hollywood ceremony later this month.
Speaking after the BAFTAs at the Royal Albert Hall in Kensington he is reported to have said backstage: “I really did not expect it.
“We’ve gone to so many of these award ceremonies and this one was where everything changed on home turf with my family in the audience.
“I used to watch this in Rayners Lane with my parents at the end of the Piccadilly Line, and for all of us to be here in our black and white and to walk the carpet, it’s kind of an out-of-body experience. Sorry, words aren’t coming right now.”
He landed his first acting role in E4 teen drama Skins, before finding international fame in Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire , which racked up seven BAFTAs including best film .
Dev himself was nominated for the best leading actor BAFTA for his role in the film but would have to wait nine years to get his hands on one of the movie industry’s top accolades.
Since Slumdog, he has had star turns in The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and its sequel, sci-fi Chappie and Aaron Sorkin’s television series The Newsroom, but has said his role in Lion is the one he has been waiting for.
In it, Dev played a man separated from his family in India as a young child, adopted by Australians and who used Google Earth to find his way home.
The emotional performance landed him nods at the Oscars, the Screen Actors Guild Awards (SAGs) and the Golden Globes.
Patel had never acted professionally before he answered an open casting call for the groundbreaking Skins.
After winning his Bafta, he said: “My mum took me to an open casting of Skins after she saw an advert in Metro newspaper and 10 years on we are here at the Baftas and that is pretty amazing.”
Dev, who now lives in Los Angeles, found it tricky to get the kind of work he wanted after Slumdog despite the film’s huge success.
Casting agents assumed the Skins star was Indian.
“After Slumdog I found it hard to find substantial follow-ups," he said.
"It’s hard when there is nothing good out there that is not your usual goofy best friend/funny sidekick/techie roles, so when a script like this comes by, it’s very rare,” he told Radio Times magazine.
And earlier this month he said flying into America felt like “a nightmare” after Donald Trump’s travel ban was announced.
He told the Press Association: “I’ve decided not to be quiet about how I’m feeling.
"I live here now. I have a home here. When I arrived back from India I felt like I was entering into a nightmare.
“I’m really grateful to the people out there marching and standing outside airports and all the protesters.”
Patel said unveiling Lion felt very different to his experiences promoting the film that made him a star.
He said: “When Slumdog first premiered it was the time people were passing around badges that read Hope, and (Barack) Obama was about to step up and there was a beautiful loving atmosphere in the air, and the film spoke to that.
“Now we are in a very different stage, we socially, politically, feel more tender. People are worried.
“As an actor I am having conversations about how relevant it is to promote a film when the fabric of society is fraying.
“But I snuck into the end of a screening to watch the last seven minutes and was quite moved by the message it is putting out of unification and love that transcends continents. It makes me happy.”
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