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What happened at the Oscars?
If you did not watch the 89th Academy Awards, then do not worry. You didn’t miss much. Expect the biggest mishap in television history!
In a bizarre turn of events, what was meant to be an incredible joyous occasion for La La Land quickly turned into a nightmare. The Best Picture nominated film cast and producers thought that they had claimed the most prestigious movie award, to only realise that this was not the case.
In fact, Moonlight was the correct winner of the award which concluded the end of an already historic night.
There is so much confusion and questions as to what happened during these events, which have somewhat been answered.
For those who do not know the process, a U.K. accountancy firm, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) handle the ballot-counting procedure, for the last 83 years. Two accountants oversee the collection of the votes and before the results are announced, those two are the only ones who are aware of who the winners are.
Envelopes are sealed in a case and handed to the presenters to announce to the world.
U.S. board chairman Brian Cullinan and tax partner Martha Ruiz have personally been leading the process these past few years. PwC have since apologised for the unfortunate mishap.
"We sincerely apologize to Moonlight, La La Land, Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway and Oscar viewers for the error that was made during the award announcement for Best Picture," read PwC's apology, hastily issued shortly after the fiasco unfolded.
"The presenters had mistakenly been given the wrong category envelope and when discovered, was immediately corrected. We are currently investigating how this could have happened, and deeply regret that this occurred. We appreciate the grace with which the nominees, the Academy, ABC, and Jimmy Kimmel handled the situation," added the statement.
La La Land producer Jordan Horowitz took control of the situation with elegance and corrected the mistake made, and graciously handed over the award to the true winners Moonlight.
"I was ecstatic, it was amazing. I thought we won an Oscar," Horowitz told The Hollywood Reporter. "Some guys in headsets started buzzing around. It became clear that was something wrong. They took the envelope I had. It said Emma Stone, La La Land on it."
"It was clear that there was something wrong. We started looking for the best picture envelope. Nobody knew where it was. Then it appeared, they opened it next to me and it said 'Moonlight.'"
Many details remain unclear at the time of writing, like how the envelopes got mixed up exactly but we are sure to get answers soon.
Although one thing should be clear, without this mishap, the Oscar’s was still an historic night with Mahershala Ali becoming the first Muslim actor to win an Academy Award, Viola Davis becoming the first black actress to win an Emmy, Tony and Oscar for acting and Moonlight being the first film with an all-black cast to win a Best Picture.
