Blake Lively gives ‘girl power’ speech at People’s Choice Awards

After five nominations, Blake Lively has taken home her first People’s Choice Award for Favourite Dramatic Actress for her role in The Shallows, and she used her speech to thank the Spice Girls.

Lively credited them for teaching her about girl power when she was a little kid.

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“I was always an ambitious kid, so I set a goal for myself… And I knew if I could accomplish it that I would be successful, and I would be happy. And that was to meet the Spice Girls,” Lively said, noting that she still hasn’t met all of them.

“What was so neat about them is that they were all so distinctly different. And they were women, and they owned who they were, and that was my first introduction to girl power,” Lively continued.

The Gossip Girl actress thanked fans not only for voting for her to win the People’s Choice Award, but for voting for a strong female character.

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“And I’m watching this movie and the women nominated in this category, and when you guys voted for this, you didn’t just vote for this movie, or for me, but you voted for girl power,” she said.

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“Thank you for sending a message to Hollywood that people want to hear stories about women.”

The mom to two ended her speech with a call to fans to share their life stories with her. “And we want to hear your stories. Whether it’s social media, your iPhone, whatever, tell your stories — now more than ever. You need to be heard, you are valuable and no one can limit you.”

She also gave a shout out to her husband, Ryan Reynolds, and jokingly warned the rest of the audience that “you can’t have him, he’s mine.”

Other actresses nominated for the Favourite Dramatic Movie Actress statue included Amy Adams, Emily Blunt, Julia Roberts and Meryl Streep.