Ethan Hawke not winning the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in Training Day wasn't a bad thing, according to Denzel Washington.

In the 2002 film, Hawke played Jake Hoyt, a rookie cop, alongside Washington, who played Alonzo Harris, a rogue detective. Ethan was nominated for his performance but ultimately lost to Jim Broadbent, who starred in Iris. However, his co-star gave him a nice confidence booster about not winning the award.

Variety reports that Hawke was on Max's Who's Talking to Chris Wallace? where he discussed the story of Oscar's loss and what was said.

Ethan Hawke tells what Denzel Washington said about not winning an Oscar

Hawke stated that Denzel whispered to him, “It's better that you didn't win. Losing was better.”

The star added, “You don't want an award to improve your status. You want to improve the award's status. That's the way he thinks.”

“That's what I'm talking about playing with Babe Ruth,” he added. “The Academy Award has more power, because Denzel has a couple. It didn't elevate who he was.”

The comparison to the legendary baseball player was mentioned because he idolizes Washington so much. He said of him, “When all is said and done he's the greatest actor of our generation.”

“That experience and that voice I started having every day, acting with Denzel, you know, his imagination is so complete,” Hawke added. “I imagine it would be interesting to see how Babe Ruth tied his shoes. You know how he thought about various pitchers. But what creates that is a tremendous amount of energy and thought, right, what creates those moments and once you see somebody working that way, it is like entrance there's all these other rooms that you can go into in the profession. And that was really inspiring to me to see my chosen profession done at that level.”

Hawke has been nominated several times for an Oscar but hasn't won yet.

“I was at the Oscars sitting next to Denzel Washington and nominated against Ian McKellen,” he continued. “I had already won. It was impossible for me not to see it any other way.”

As for what he's up to now, he worked with his daughter, Maya Hawke, in the new film Wildcat.

He told Chris Wallace, “The biggest challenge is releasing the movie, giving it to the public, because I knew the dad daughter act is not cute. I love working with my daughter. That doesn't mean somebody should pay money to spend a minute of their time watching. Nobody wants to see family art.”

Wildcat follows the life of writer Flannery O'Connor and explores her struggles to publish her first novel. Maya plays O'Connor, and Ethan Hawke directed and wrote the script. The film comes out on May 3 in theaters everywhere.