Entertainment_Weekly_Issue_1456_March_10_2017

46 EW.COM MARCH 10, 2017

BARRY JENKINSis developing a limited TV series based on Colson Whitehead’s prize-winning novelThe Underground Railroad.

Mahershala Ali won Best Supporting

Actor forMoonlight, becoming the first

Muslim actor to ever win an Oscar. And

Viola Davis, Best Supporting Actress winner

for her role inFences, capped off a season of

stirring speeches with a moving tribute to

playwright August Wilson and her parents.

“Late one night I thought about what

August Wilson means to me as an artist and

I thought about my mom and dad,” Davis

told EW, moments after her nameplate was

affixed to her statue. “My dad died in 2006

and my mom is still alive. I wanted to honor

them and honor August.”

Until its climax, the ceremony unfolded

smoothly, even with host Jimmy Kimmel’s

signature mischief. He brought a busload of

stunned tourists into the Dolby Theatre,

dropped candy and doughnuts from the

rafters via parachutes, and spent quite a bit of

time humiliating Matt Damon—with whom

he has a long-running comedic “feud.”

La La director Damien Chazelle, felled

by Oscar-campaign exhaustion, had missed

show rehearsals all week, but he recovered

in time to become the youngest directing

winner ever, at 32. He brushed off Kimmel’s

jokes about his youth. “Let’s keep that illu-

sion going,” he said, in the Dolby’s lobby

during a break from the telecast. On the

surface, his win seemed to presage a

La LaBest Picture triumph—but a cloud

lurked behind that silver lining. In the pre-

vious four years, the Academy had given

the directing and picture Oscars to the

same film only once (2014’sBirdman).

Casey Affleck’s Best Actor win for Man-

chester by the Sea came as a bit of a surprise.

He had been an early front-runner, but his

momentum had been slowed by reminders

of sexual-harassment charges filed against

him seven years ago in two civil suits, which

he settled out of court. He had lost the

Screen Actors Guild award to Denzel Wash-

ington forFences, and in the past decade, no

actor had won the Oscar in this category

without getting the SAG award first. But

according to Affleck’s costar Michelle

Williams, he was always going to win.

“I felt like his mother tonight,” says

Williams. “I couldn’t be happier.”

ERROR IN

JUDGMENT

It may have started

with a tweet...but it

ended with a gasp.

The Oscar telecast

was going well until

Pricewaterhouse-

Coopers accountant

Brian Cullinan handed

Best Picture presenter

Warren Beatty the wrong

envelope. One of only

two people on the planet

who knew the winners in

advance, Cullinan was

parked on the left side of

the stage while his col-

league Martha Ruiz was

stationed on the right.

Each had an identical set

of sealed envelopes to

hand to the presenters

before they waltzed into

the spotlight.

According to PwC,

each accountant then

formed two stacks of

envelopes: one for the

presenters entering on

their side of the stage,

and a “backup” stack for

those who entered from

the other side. Cullinan

accidently pulled from

the wrong pile, handing

Beatty the duplicate

Best Actress envelope

instead of the one for

Best Picture. Why?

Reportedly, he may have

been distracted, tweet-

ing a photo of Best

Actress winner Emma

Stone. (The tweet has

now been deleted. PwC

did not respond to EW’s

interview request.)

ERROR IN

LITERACY

Beatty, confused by what

he saw on the card,

stalled while hisBonnie

and Clyde costar Faye

Dunaway egged him on.

“You’re impossible,” she

teased. He showed her

the card. She called out

La La Land.

PANIC BUTTON

Immediately, PwC real-

ized the mistake. The

two accountants hus-

tled to open the other

Best Picture envelope

that readMoonlight

before sending a stage-

hand out to correct the

error.La La Land pro-

ducers Jordan Horowitz

and Marc Platt had

already given their

speeches, and producer

Fred Berger was about

to begin his when

Horowitz saw the cor-

rect card. “I took the

envelope and went up

to the mic,” Horowitz

said later at the Gover-

nors Ball. “What else

are you going to do?”

BLAME GAME

PwC has accepted

responsibility, saying in

part, “Once the error

occurred, protocols for

correcting it were not

followed through quickly

enough by Mr. Cullinan

or his partner.” The

Academy issued an apol-

ogy Monday night, but

Beatty was in no mood

to talk. In an email to the

media, he wrote, “Rather

than for me to respond

to questions from the

press about the Acad-

emy ceremony, I feel it

would be more appropri-

ate for the president of

the Academy, Cheryl

Boone Isaacs, to publicly

clarify what happened

as soon as possible.”

—NICOLE SPERLING

Faye Dunaway and

Warren Beatty

DUNAWAY AND BEATTY: EDDY CHEN/ABC VIA GETTY IMAGES