Forget the Embarrassing Mix-up. The Real Story Is Moonlight’s Historic Win

Hollywood veteran Faye Dunaway made a booboo when she announced the wrong victor for best picture, awarding the trophy to La La Land when it actually was supposed to go to Moonlight.

As a result, presenter Warren Beatty carried the wrong envelope to center stage Sunday night, meaning that his on-stage partner, Faye Dunaway, announced La La Land was the victor of the night’s top prize.

After a befuddled Dunaway read out La La Land as the victor, a contingent of very happy people from the film took to the stage. In addition to her tabulation responsibilities, Ruiz is a tax partner in the professional services firm’s entertainment, media and communications practice. “We are now investigating how this could have happened, and deeply regret that this occurred”. The only similar Oscars mistake that came close occurred in 1964, when Sammy Davis was given the wrong envelope for best music score victor but made a quick correction.

“Accountants are supposed to set up systems that don’t fail”, he said.

The system behind the Oscars envelopes is an intense and secretive one.

Now, with one gaffe, the Oscar instead slung a bucket of water on the gas fire, and the Oscars got skewered on its own petard-through no real fault of the Academy itself. So, depending on how a celebrity goes through the backstage area, it is possible that one card is given to two people.

Ryan said that both Cullinan and Ruiz realized instantly that an error had been made. “Uh, that was awkward”, Moonlight star Mahershala Ali said to no one in particular, before running into Ryan Gosling. We either believe in the Oscars’ claim that representation matters and thus harp on what it means that Moonlight’s big moment was or we say the Oscars are just an award show.

Both of PwC’s representatives at the show have a briefcase on either side of the auditorium to hand out the envelope for the category to be announced.

So what happened? Someone handed Beatty the wrong envelope; the envelope he had on stage was for Best Actress, which Emma Stone won for La-La Land. “It doesn’t sound very complicated, but you have to make sure you’re giving the presenter the right envelope”.

How could that insane mishap have happened at the 2017 Oscars? “I don’t know what to say”.

Beatty, who looked embarrassed on stage, explained that he had seen Emma Stone for La La Land on the sheet of paper, which is why he appeared confused before reading out the name. The producers of La La Land were almost 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.

After La La Land’s Jordan Horowitz announced the epic mix-up to the stunned audience from the stage, Cullinan could be seen on stage looking at the different cards.

One new twist I enjoyed was having presenters talk on film about a performance and movie that really influenced them, and then pairing them with those actors/actresses, which gave us a chance to see Shirley MacLaine – still amusing – and Michael J. Fox, still inspiring.

Accounting and consulting firm PwC has handled the balloting process at the Oscars for 82 years.

Meanwhile, Stone (who won for Best Actress earlier in the evening) was visibly stunned, repeating “Oh my God”.

For now, it’s dealing with Sunday’s fallout.

A later-deleted tweet from Cullinan available on Google’s archive.