Barry Jenkins has described the moment he found out 'Moonlight' had won the Oscar for Best Picture after 'La La Land' was incorrectly read out as "insane".
Barry Jenkins
Chaos reigned at the 89th Annual Academy Awards at Los Angeles' Dolby Theatre on Sunday (26.02.17) after veteran actor Warren Beatty mistakenly announced the musical movie as the winner of the night's most prestigious accolade, when in fact it was the drama that had been awarded the honour.
'Moonlight's director Barry Jenkins, 37, said after the scandal that the dramatic turn of events had been hard for him to process.
He said: "The last 20 minutes of my life have been insane. I don't think my life could be changed any more dramatically than [in] the last 20 or 30 minutes."
And Barry had nothing but sympathy for 'La La Land's producer Jordan Horowitz, who was halfway through giving an emotional acceptance speech before the mishap was revealed.
He added to 'Entertainment Tonight' at the Governors Ball after the ceremony: "I could see it in Jordan's face, that he was speaking the truth. In that moment I just felt ... I wanted to feel compassion for him. I'm pretty sure the first thing I do when I get up on stage is give him a hug, because it couldn't have been easy. But these things happen, you know. They happen."
Meanwhile, Warren Beatty - who was presenting the award with Faye Dunaway - said the mistake occurred as he was given the wrong envelope.
He said: "I opened the envelope and it said Emma Stone, 'La La Land' - that's why I took such a long look at you and Faye.
"I wasn't trying to be funny."
It wasn't all bad news for 'La La Land' though, as the critically acclaimed movie still walked away the winners with a total of six Academy Awards, including Best Actress for Emma Stone's performance, and Best Director for Damien Chazelle.
Tagged in Faye Dunaway Warren Beatty Emma Stone