Ahead of Sunday’s 2025 Oscars, PEOPLE is looking back at past ceremonies and sharing behind-the-scenes stories from Hollywood’s most prestigious event.

Jennifer Hudson won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her film debut in 2006’s Dreamgirls, but the American Idol alum didn’t know too much about the Academy Awards before her big night in 2007.

“It sounds so harsh, but I wasn’t too familiar with the Oscars because my dream was to be a singer and win Grammys,” she revealed in Dave Karger’s 2024 50 Oscar Nights book.

“So even down to the night of being there, I remember [costar] Jamie Foxx saying, ‘The craziest thing is she has no clue to what is going on.’ I was experiencing it as I went along.”

In the film adaptation of the 1982 Broadway musical, Hudson played Effie White, one of three young Black women in a 1960s girl group. Effie is initially the lead singer, but is pushed aside by manager Curtis (Foxx), who puts Deena Jones (Beyoncé) front and center, causing friction. Anika Noni Rose played the third member of the group.

Admittedly, Hudson didn’t know much about Dreamgirls either, a story loosely based on The Supremes. After her stint on American Idol in 2004, “it was kind of like starting over,” Hudson told Karger. “I had a production deal and I was just recording music. As long as I was singing, I was happy, you know?”

“People would say, ‘Jennifer Hudson for Effie White.’ And I’m like, ‘Who is Effie White?’ I knew ‘And I Am Telling You I’m Not Going’ and ‘I Am Changing,’ but I didn’t know who the character was,” she continued.

That character would wind up changing the course of her career, helping her transform from former reality TV show contestant to A-lister.

At the 79th Academy Awards, Dreamgirls was up for eight Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Supporting Actress. Hudson shared the category with Cate Blanchett (Notes on a Scandal), Adriana Barraza (Babel), Rinko Kikuchi (Babel), and Abigail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine).

Hudson, of course, prevailed. And as for that Grammy she hoped to win one day when she was younger? She has since won two: Best R&B Album in 2009 and Best Musical Theater Album for The Color Purple eight years later.

In 2021, she also won a Daytime Emmy for the animated short Baba Yaga, which she co-produced and voiced. The following year, she won a Tony Award when A Strange Loop, on which she was a producer, won best musical — making her an EGOT winner at age 40.

Conan O’Brien hosts the 2025 Oscars, which will air live from the Dolby Theatre at Ovation Hollywood on Sunday, March 2, at 7 p.m. ET on ABC and Hulu.