Alfonso Cuaron and Jehane Noujaim win the DGA awards

Alfonso Cuaron with last year’s winner Ben Affleck

As widely predicted, Alfonso Cuaron snapped the top prize at the Directors Guild Awards last night for the space odyssey, Gravity, cementing his position as the leading front runner in the Oscar race in the best director category. A couple of weeks ago, he won the Golden Globe award in the same category.

Egyption director, Jehane Noujaim, made history for being the first Egyptian to win the best documentary director DGA award for The Square, which explores the recent revolution in Egypt. The Square is the first Egyptian film to be nominated for an Oscar.

Meanwhile, Steven Soderbergh continued to collect trophies for his TV movie, Behind the Candelabra, winning the Outstanding Directorial Achievement for a TV Movie or Miniseries award. The HBO film has already won the Emmys and the Golden Globes, but this was Soderbergh’s first DGA win.

TV hit series, Breaking Bad, was also honoured for the first time by the DGA. Its creator Vince Gilligan won the award for directing the series finale, Felina. Meanwhile, Beth McCarthy-Miller took the DGA honour for the last episode of 30 Rock.

The DGA awards ceremony was held at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza hotel in Century City and was hosted by Glee’s Jane Lynch.