Epic flub:
An Oscars night which will be remembered for Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway’s ‘wrong envelope’ fiasco
Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight — not, as it turned out, La La Land — won best picture at the Academy Awards in a historic Oscar upset and an unprecedented fiasco that saw one winner swapped for another while the La La Land producers were in mid-speech. Presenters Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway apparently took the wrong envelope — the one for best actress winner Emma Stone — onto the stage. When they realised the mistake, representatives for ballot tabulators Price Waterhouse Coopers raced onstage to stop the acceptance speech.
But backstage, Stone said she was holding with her envelope at the time.
“I think everyone’s in a state of confusion still,’’ said Stone. Later the actress, who pledged her deep love of Moonlight, added, “Is that the craziest Oscar moment of all time? Cool!’’.
It was, nevertheless, a shocking upset considering that La La Land came in with 14 nominations, a record that tied it with Titanic and
All About Eve. Barry Jenkins’ tender, bathed-in-blue coming-of-age drama, made for just US$1.5 million (52 million baht), is an unusually small Oscar winner. Having made just over $22 million as of Sunday at the box office, it’s one of the lowest grossing best-picture winners ever.
“Even in my dreams this cannot be true,’’ said an astonished Jenkins, once he reached the stage.
Host Jimmy Kimmel had come forward to inform the cast that Moonlight had indeed won, showing the inside of the envelope as proof.
“I knew I would screw this up,’’ said Kimmel, a first-time host. “I promise to never come back.’’
Producer Jordan Horwitz then graciously passed his statue to the
Moonlight producers.
Up until the chaotic end, the telecast had seesawed between jabs at Donald Trump and passionate arguments for inclusivity, with awards going to La La Land, Moonlight and Manchester By The Sea. Damien Chazelle’s celebrated musical La La Land, up for a record-tying 14 nominations, took a while to start cleaning up. But as the night went on, its haul began piling up, winning for cinematography, production, score, song City Of Stars and best actress for Emma Stone. Chazelle, the 32-year-old filmmaker, also became the youngest to win best director.
“This was a movie about love and I was luckily enough to fall in love while making it,’’ said Chazelle, speaking about his girlfriend and Oscars date, Olivia Hamilton.
Barry Jenkins, the writer-director of Moonlight and Tarell Alvin McCraney, whose play it was based on, won for adapted screenplay.
“All you people out there who feel like there isn’t a mirror out there for you, the academy has your back, the ACLU has your back and for the next four years we will not leave you alone, we will not forget you,’’ said Jenkins.
Kenneth Lonergan won best original screenplay.
“I love the movies. I love being part of the movies,’’ said Lonergan, who then thanked his star. “Thank you Casey Affleck, Casey Affleck, Casey Affleck.’’
Shortly later, Affleck — in one of the night’s most closely watched categories, Affleck won best actor — his first Oscar — for his soulful, grief-filled performance in Manchester By The Sea. Affleck and Denzel Washington ( Fences) were seen as neck-andneck in the category. An admittedly “dumbfounded’’ Affleck looked shocked when his name was read.
“Man I wish I had something bigger and more meaningful to say,’’ said Affleck, who hugged his more famous brother, Ben, before taking the stage.
The show kicked off with Justin Timberlake dancing down the Dolby Theatre aisles, singing his ebullient song, Can’t Stop The Feeling, from the animated film Trolls. It was an early cue that the Oscars would steer, at least in part, toward festiveness rather than heavy-handedness. Protests, boycotts and rallies have swirled ahead of Sunday night’s Oscars. But host Kimmel, in his opening monologue, quickly acknowledged that he “was not that guy’’ to heal a divided America.
But he still, pointedly, led a standing ovation for the “overrated’’ Meryl Streep. He later tweaked the president by tweeting to him on air, including telling him that Streep “says hi”.
The wins for Davis, who co-starred in Denzel Washington’s August Wilson adaptation Fences, and Mahershala Ali, the Moonlight co-star, were both widely expected. Their awards marked the first time in more than a decade that multiple Oscar acting honours went to black actors.
“I became an artist, and thank god I did, because we are the only profession to celebrate what it means to live a life,’’ said Davis, the best supporting actress winner. “So here’s to August Wilson, who exhumed and exalted the ordinary people.’’
Ali won best supporting actor for Moonlight. He glowed on the stage as he informed the crowd that he and his wife, Amatus Sami-Karim, welcomed a daughter four days earlier. The actor thanked his wife for “being such a soldier through the process”.
Both stuck to more private reflections over politics. But a more blunt protest came from a winner not in attendance. Best foreign film for the second time went to Asghar Farhadi, director of Iran’s A Salesman. Farhadi, who also won for his A Separation, had said he wouldn’t attend because of Trump’s travel band to seven predominantly Muslim nations. Anousheh Ansari, an Iranian astronaut, read a statement from Farhadi.
“I’m sorry I’m not with you tonight,’’ it read. “My absence is out of respect for the people of my country and those of other six nations who have been disrespected by the inhumane law that bans entry of immigrants to the US.’’
The broadcast often veered between such strong personal statements and Kimmel’s efforts to keep things a little lighter with bits reminiscent of his latenight show. Shortly before he led a dazed, unsuspecting tour group into the theatre, presenter Gael Garcia Bernal, the Mexican actor, declared: “As a migrant worker, as a Mexican, and as a human being, I am against any wall.’’ Rich Moore, one of the three directors of Disney’s best animated film winner Zootopia, described the movie as about “tolerance being more powerful than fear of the other”.
Gibson’s World War II drama Hacksaw Ridge was, surprisingly, the evening’s first double winner, taking awards for editing and sound mixing. The bearded Gibson, for a decade a pariah in Hollywood, was seated front and centre for the show, and was a frequent presence throughout.
Ezra Edelman’s O.J.: Made In America took best documentary, making it — at 467 minutes — the longest Oscar winner ever, beating out the 1969 Best Foreign Language Film winner War And Peace (431 minutes). Edelman’s documentary, while it received an Oscar-qualifying theatrical release, was seen by most on ESPN as a serial, prompting some to claim its place was at the Emmys, not the Oscars.
Edelman dedicated the award to the victims of the famous crime, Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman.
“This is also for other victims, victims of police violence, police brutality,’’ Edelman said. “This is their story as it is Ron and Nicole’s.’’
The “OscarsSoWhite’’ crisis of the last two years was largely quelled this season by a richly diverse slate of nominees, thanks to films like Moonlight, Fences and Hidden Figures. A record six black actors are nominated. For the first time ever, a person of colour is nominated in each acting category. And four of the five best documentary nominees were also directed by black filmmakers.
“I want to say thank you to President Trump,’’ Kimmel said in the opening. “Remember last year when it seemed like the Oscars were racist?’’.
The nominees follow the efforts by Academy of Motions Pictures Arts and Sciences President Cheryl Boone Isaacs to diversify the membership of the largely white, older and male film academy. In June, the academy added 683 new members: 46% of them were female; 41% were nonwhite; and they pulled from 59 countries.
“Tonight is proof that art has no borders, no single language and does not belong to a single faith,’’ said Isaacs.
Hacksaw Ridge, the true story of a heroic World War II medic, won Oscars for sound mixing and film editing, a category that is often predictive of the best picture winner. Kenneth Longergan won the best screenplay statuette for his Manchester By The Sea, the story of a grieving New England handyman. Casey Affleck, who played the lead role in Lonergan’s film, beat Denzel Washington ( Fences) for best actor. “I’m just dumbfound I’m included,” Affleck said. The supporting acting prizes went to Viola Davis for her work in Fences, about a Pittsburgh family in the 1950s, and Mahershala Ali for his portrayal of a sympathetic drug dealer in Moonlight, which also collected the adapted screenplay Oscar, for Jenkins and Tarell Alvin McCraney.
“All you people out there who feel like there’s no mirror for you, that your life is not reflected, the academy has your back the ACLU has your back, we have your back — and for the next four years, we will not leave you alone, we will not forget you,” Jenkins said from the stage.
Among the nominees leaving with nothing:
Lion, an adoption tear-jerker with six nominations, and the box office hit Hidden Figures, which had three nods.
As expected, Davis won the best supporting actress Oscar — her first — for playing a worldweary housewife in Fences. (She won best actress at the 2010 Tony Awards for playing the same role onstage. She was the one who decided to drop to the supporting category for the Oscars.)
An intense, nearly overcome Davis touched on her family, her industry “cheerleaders,” the film’s director (Denzel Washington), graveyards, dashed dreams and the playwright August Wilson, who adapted his Fences for the screen and whom Viola praised as someone who “exhumed and exalted the ordinary people”.
The night’s first award, best supporting actor, went to Ali, who tearfully thanked the cast and crew of Moonlight and his own family. “Peace and blessings,” he said, avoiding a repeat of the pointed comments he made at previous awards shows about the Trump administration’s travel ban.
After two years when the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was criticised as racist for overlooking black actors and films about African-American experiences, this year’s nominee list was remarkably diverse.
Six black actors received nominations, a record The foreign film and documentary races were notably relevant this year.
Among foreign films, the German satire Toni Erdmann initially had the momentum. But Trump’s travel ban put the spotlight on Iran’s entry, The Salesman, whose director, Asghar Farhadi, said that he would boycott the ceremony in protest — a decision that may have ultimately helped his film win.
Anousheh Ansari, an American-Iranian businesswoman, accepted the award for The Salesman and read a message from Farhadi. The note said he was not attending in solidarity with immigrants “who have been disrespected by the inhumane law”, referring to the Trump administration’s travel ban.
Among nonfiction films, Ava DuVernay’s much-esteemed look at mass incarceration, 13th, was campaigned for aggressively by Netflix and the civil rights-themed I Am Not Your Negro surged late in the season. But the nearly eight-hour, is-ita-miniseries-or-is-it-a-film O.J.: Made In America was named best documentary. In accepting the award, Ezra Edelman, the film’s director, dedicated the award to Nicole Brown Simpson, Ronald Goldman and “the victims of police violence, police brutality, racially motivated violence and criminal injustice”.