Wrap-up: An Oscar for ‘The Goof-up’

It was one of the most awkward moments in the history of the Oscars, of television, in entertainment, heck maybe in American history. And somehow Warren Beatty, Hollywood’s ultimate smooth leading man, was at the center of it. The producers of La La Land were nearly done with their acceptance speeches for Best Picture, the Oscar broadcast’s credits sequence about to roll, when a stir of whispers began on stage. Moments later La La Land producer Jordan Horowitz returned to the microphone and said “Moonlight won Best Picture” and insisting that “this is not a joke.”

The collective jaw of the crowd at the Dolby Theatre —  and of America — remained dropped long after they became convinced it was no joke, but what academy historians later called an apparently unprecedented Oscar error.

Beatty returned to the mic and amid silence, explained that he had opened the envelope and he was confused when it read “Emma Stone, La La Land.” He had shown it to co-presenter Faye Dunaway, as though he wanted her to read it, which she did, apparently assuming the Emma Stone part was off but the La La... part correct.

“It’s one of the strangest things that’s ever happened to me,” Beatty said backstage. “Thank God there were two of us up there,” Dunaway responded. The actress then asked Beatty, “Who else should I tell?” “Everybody,” he said.

At that point, a security guard tried to take the real envelope and Beatty said, “Security is not getting this. I’m giving it to (Moonlight director) Barry Jenkins at a later time.” Beatty also refused to show it to anyone else.

PwC is the accounting firm that counts votes and provides winner envelopes for the Oscars and has done so for more than 80 years. When the firm’s representatives realised the mistake, they raced onstage to right it, but too late.

The result was a bizarre scene with the entire cast of both movies standing together on stage exchanging sympathetic awkward stares and hugs.