In between the one-liners, surprise presenters and bottomless champagne, something remarkable happened at last night’s 72nd Golden Globe Awards.

26 awards were given last night to the best in film and television. But two in particular were especially meaningful.

Julianne Moore plays a professor grappling with Alzheimer’s in Still Alice [Credit: Sony Pictures Classics]

I am referring, of course, to Julianne Moore and Eddie Redmayne, who each took home awards in the lead acting categories for their portrayals of two individuals suffering from neurodegenerative diseases. Their wins not only solidified them as front-runners for the Academy Awards ceremony next month, but also gave millions of viewers a deeply intimate look at two unforgiving illnesses.

Eddie Redmayne as Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything [Credit: Focus Features]

Renowned actress Julianne Moore was the first of the two to receive her award, winning for her role as Alice Howland, a Columbia linguistics professor diagnosed with Early-Onset Alzheimer’s disease, in the film Still Alice.

And later in the program the Globes honored Eddie Redmayne for his brilliant portrayal of Professor Stephen Hawking—a long-time sufferer of the motor neuron disease ALS—in the biopic The Theory of Everything.

These two films were particularly poignant for those in the Alzheimer’s and ALS communities—as they reveal in stark, sometimes disturbing detail, how these diseases wreak havoc on the brain and nervous system. In preparation for their roles, each spent several months speaking with patients and clinicians who see and live with the diseases every day.

For example, Moore spoke with women who—like her character Alice—were living with Early-Onset Alzheimer’s, giving her first-hand knowledge of not only how the disease affects them, but also how their families are affected.

Meanwhile, Redmayne spent significant time with Hawking himself, learning about his unique experience as a long-time ALS patient. In interviews Redmayne has said that Hawking was often present during filming. The time the two individuals spent with each other clearly paid off, and had a remarkable impact on the actor.

“It is a great privilege for me to be in this room,” Redmayne said during his Golden Globe acceptance speech. “Getting to spend time with Stephen Hawking … was one of the great, great honors of my life.”

The fact that the two lead acting awards put spotlight on these diseases was not lost on the patient advocacy communities. For example, Maria Shriver tweeted shortly after the awards ceremony:

Shriver’s statement underscores the stark reality of awareness, or lack thereof, for neurodegenerative diseases. Here at CIRM, we are laser focused on supporting ground-breaking work in regenerative medicine that can slow, halt or even reverse these conditions. We are hopeful that these two actors’ stellar performances can help put a human face on conditions that are all too-often reduced to numbers.

This hope has thus far translated to these films’ audiences. For example, said one review of Still Alice from the New York Post:

“Still Alice … presents a disease that can devastate any family, anywhere, with unsparing truth and great compassion.”

Read more about how regenerative medicine can change the face of Alzheimer’s and ALS on our Stories of Hope.