The Academy Awards will be bestowed on deserving movies this Sunday night. There have been changes made to ensure that the ceremony won't turn out like it did last year, when the wrong envelope made its way to the stage and La La Land was announced as the winner of the Oscar for Best Picture. After the producers and cast ascended the stage, the mistake was discovered, and La La Land producer Jordan Horowitz interrupted producer Marc Platt's speech to announce that the real winner was Moonlight. The Best Picture award went to a deserving film, but Moonlight was cheated out of its moment in the sun because the snafu dominated the headlines -and social media. Horowitz's announcement became the news.
“It was palpable that people were still super confused,” Horowitz said. He knew that there was one thing left to do. So he put his left hand on his chest to brace himself, swiftly snatched away Beatty’s card, held it up, and said, “Moonlight. Best Picture.” That instant, he thought to himself, I hope the camera person knows what to do. Sure enough, 33 million viewers watching ABC’s telecast of the Academy Awards were treated to a close-up of the card, which indicated that Moonlight had indeed won Best Picture. “The camera person knew exactly what to do,” Horowitz said. After he displayed evidence that proved his claim, the producer continued, “Everybody was like, ‘Oh shit, this is real.’”
A year later, Horowitz talks about what he was thinking and feeling at that moment, and how he inadvertently became the star of the internet for the next few days, at The Ringer. -via Digg
(Image credit: Michael Weinstein)