The speech Moonlight director never got to give

Moonlight director Barry Jenkins had a speech prepared just in case his movie won best picture Sunday. But, as he told Variety, “that thing went completely out the window.”

That’s because, as everyone now knows, he had already lost by the time he won. Three La La Land acceptance speeches had gotten underway before producer Jordan Horowitz found out his movie hadn’t won and he alerted the crowd.

In the aftermath, it seems like Moonlight was robbed not just of the glory, overshadowed by an error that will go down in history, but also of that moment of pure joy an Oscar winner gets upon hearing the name of the movie called by presenters. When Jenkins finally made his way to the stage, he was too overwhelmed by the emotional whiplash to give the speech he had planned.

On Wednesday, however, he wrote in the Hollywood Reporter, “Best picture is a producer’s award, so I didn’t plan to say much.

“The plan was to have Adele Romanski speak first, then Jeremy Kleiner and, finally, briefly, myself. I planned to keep it personal, repeating and evolving a story I’ve told throughout the season:

“(Writer) Tarell (Alvin McCraney) and I are Chiron. We are that boy. And when you watch Moonlight, you don’t assume a boy who grew up how and where we did would grow up and make a piece of art that wins an Academy Award. I’ve said that a lot, and what I’ve had to admit is that I placed those limitations on myself, I denied myself that dream. Not you, not anyone else — me. And so, to anyone watching this who sees themselves in us, let this be a symbol, a reflection that leads you to love yourself. Because doing so may be the difference between dreaming at all and, somehow through the Academy’s grace, realizing dreams you never allowed yourself to have. Much love.” With files from the Washington Post