The Oscars Mishap

Daniel Meyers

On Feb. 27, 2017, the 89th Annual Academy Awards took place, featuring a whole plethora of star-studded attendees who were nominated for an award, planning to perform, or just supporting close friends. This year, the awards took place at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood and everyone was very excited to see which nominees would walk away with an award.

 

This year, the awards seemed to flow very smoothly with little to no mistakes or technical difficulties, which is not too common for a live show. But, when Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway were given the incorrect winning envelope for “Best Picture,” false glorification and embarrassing revelations were what the show consisted of for a good 10 minutes following the mix-up.

 

What had happened was, instead of being the envelope for “Best Picture,” Beatty and Dunaway accidentally received the envelope for “Best Actress”, who was Emma Stone, for her work in La La Land.  Thus, when the time came around for the winner of “Best Picture” to be announced, the incorrect envelope in the presenter’s hands, which allowed La La Land to be deemed the winner over the award’s rightful winner, Moonlight. Jordan Horowitz, a producer of La La Land, was the one who broke the news to the audience of the mishap, completely shifting the mood in the room.

 

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), the accounting firm that counts the Oscar ballots released a statement saying: “PwC takes full responsibility for the series of mistakes and breaches of established protocols during last night’s Oscars. PwC Partner Brian Cullinan mistakenly handed the back-up envelope for Actress in a Leading Role instead of the envelope for Best Picture to presenters Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway. Once the error occurred, protocols for correcting it were not followed through quickly enough by Mr. Cullinan or his partner.”

 

Just like that, the mystery was solved. All the Academy can do is accept that this mistake occurred and plan for an even grander show next year with hopefully no mistakes!