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Oscar hopes for "Birdman" got an enormous updraft over the weekend with big wins from the acting and producing guilds, possibly sending the comedy soaring over the perceived Academy Awards front-runner "Boyhood."

Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu's elegantly crafted backstage romp won best ensemble Sunday night at the 21st annual Screen Actors Guild, a day after it also won the top honor at the Producer Guild Awards. Both guilds are seen as highly predictive of which film will triumph at the Oscars, which will be held Feb. 22.

Richard Linklater's "Boyhood," the acclaimed indie made with the unprecedented real-life time-elapse of 12 years, has long held as the awards seasons favorite. But "Birdman" fills the role of a classic Oscar winner, like "Shakespeare in Love," as a celebration of showbiz. Its fortunes look especially bright considering the last seven Producers Guild Awards winners have also won best picture at the Academy Awards.

"Actors love this movie for showing the courage actors have to kind of go out there and lay it on the line," "Birdman" star Michael Keaton said backstage at the SAG Awards. He accepted the best ensemble award with his co-stars including Emma Stone, Edward Norton and Zach Galifianakis.

Most outstanding actor went to "The Theory of Everything" star Eddie Redmayne, whose exceeding technical performance as Stephen Hawking has drawn raves. Looking down at his blue statuette, Redmayne dedicated the SAG Award to sufferers and victims of ALS.

The other Oscar favorites — Julianne Moore, Patricia Arquette and J.K. Simmons — all cemented their front-runner status in a glamorous, self-congratulatory ceremony.

Moore, widely considered the best-actress favorite, won most outstanding actress for "Still Alice," in which she plays an academic with early onset Alzheimer's Disease.

Accepting the award for most outstanding supporting actor for his performance as a domineering jazz teacher in "Whiplash," Simmons thanked all 49 actors who appear in the drama.

"All of us actors are supporting actors," said Simmons, a veteran character actor. "Each of us is essential, completely crucial to the story because if there's one false moment, the train comes off the rails."

"Boyhood" star Arquette added the latest in a nearly uninterrupted string of supporting-actress awards. "This little movie is about human beings and it's about bringing real life onto the screen," she said backstage.

Sunday's show kicked things off with a pair of wins for the Netflix prison series "Orange Is the New Black," honoring it as best ensemble in a comedy and naming Uzo Aduba most outstanding actress in a comedy series.

Two actors who usually reside on the big screen won the SAG awards for performances in a miniseries or TV movie: Mark Ruffalo (for HBO's "A Normal Heart") and Frances McDormand (for HBO's "Olive Kitteredge"). Kevin Spacey ("House of Cards"), William H. Macy ("Shameless") and Viola Davis ("How to Get Away With Murder") also collected awards.

Debbie Reynolds, the "Singin' in the Rain" star, was honored with the SAG lifetime achievement award, which her daughter, Carrie Fisher, presented. Reynolds embarrassed Fisher with a story, recalling that her bun in the famous musical led her to warn her daughter ahead of playing Princess Leia in "Star Wars."

"I said, 'Well, Carrie, be careful of any weird hairdos,'" said Reynolds. "So luckily George gave her two buns."

She also remembered one of her favorite films, 1964's "The Unsinkable Molly Brown."

"In that movie I got to sing a wonderful song 'I Ain't Down Yet,'" said Reynolds. "Well, I ain't."