Until Sunday, we’ve had two “Dewey Defeats Truman” moments since November. Of course, the election. Next? The Super Bowl which still keeps me awake at night.
And now? A third.
In this week’s edition of Fake News Watch: La La Land completes its Oscars dominance and takes home the Academy Award for Best Picture. Of course, as we all quickly realized—the actual winner was Moonlight.
The entire thing was just…bizarre. You knew something was awry as soon as Warren Beatty opened the envelope. His confused expression led me to believe the winner might be written in wingdings. In a turn of comedic irony, the befuddled Beatty passed the envelope to his Bonnie and Clyde counterpart, Faye Dunaway, as the two proceeded to commit one of Hollywood’s biggest offenses.
“And the winner is…La La Land.”
Oh, boy. Talk about an “alternative fact.”
What followed was, of course, chaos. An elated La La Land cast filled the stage. Two acceptance speeches were given. Headset-wearing producers stalked the stage, signaling that something had gone terribly wrong. Mercifully, an announcement was finally made—complete with “this is not a joke” caveats—and Moonlight took home the evening’s greatest honor.
After some backstage sleuthing, it was revealed that Beatty and Dunaway had not just flubbed the winner. Beatty was actually handed the wrong envelope—a duplicate for the Best Actress award; hence his obvious confusion, and the awkward bit of envelope hot potato behind the microphone.
“Chaos Reigns” is a fitting motto for 2017. Hang on tight, folks—we’ve got 10 months left.
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