GUYANA CHRONICLE Tuesday, February 28, 2017
The Oscars blunder will forever overshadow Moonlight’s historic night
[CNN] - “Moonlight” won. Let’s be very clear about that before we talk about anything else. THE same Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences that has bestowed its best picture award to such glossy, hallowed artifacts as “Gone With the Wind,” “An American in Paris” and “The Godfather” this year gave its biggest prize to a small, critically acclaimed and artistically daring film about a troubled African-American youth struggling with a broken home, confronting his sexuality and stalked by the prospect of violence. The significance of this best picture award can’t be understated and its essence, the potential broadening of storytelling possibilities for American movies, was best summarised earlier in the evening when “Moonlight” collected the best adapted screenplay Oscar for director Barry Jenkins and co-producer Tarell Alvin McCraney, who wrote the original semi-autobiographical stage play “In Moonlight, Black Boys Look Blue.” “This goes out to all those black and brown boys and girls and non-gender conforming, who don’t see themselves, we’re trying to show you and us,” McCraney said in their acceptance speech. At that point in the 89th annual Academy Awards, already groundbreaking in its broad presence of African-American nominees in several categories, many in
Barry Jenkins poses with his Oscar. REUTERS/Mike Blake the audience and millions tagonist under his care. With watching on television be- all these potentially transforlieved that would be the only mative moments in play, it’s a other major award “Moon- shame that all people will talk light” would collect -- besides about, from this day forward,
moment, he resembled nothing so much as the manic and suicidal senator from his 1998 movie, “Bulworth,” looking as if he were going to trip over his shoes. The problem was simple: Somebody had handed him the envelope that earlier announced Emma Stone as the best actress winner for “La La Land.” Seeing Beatty’s bafflement, Dunaway genially muttered what sounded like “You’re impossible, Warren!” before taking hold of the envelope and reading what by that point everybody believed was the inevitable winner: “La La Land,” the musical romance that had already col-
Viola Davis holds her Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for ‘Fences’ REUTERS/Danny Moloshok Helmets” -- a documentary abusive tweets about Meryl about the volunteers of the Streep before tweeting the same name saving lives in suspiciously silent President Syria -- winning a first Oscar to check if he was OK. for Netflix; Iranian director, And though some acceptance speeches were too long, others were eloquent and touching: among the best came from Stone, Jenkins, Ali and Viola Davis, whose Best Supporting Actress win for “Fences” made her the first African American actress to achieve the Tony-Emmy-Oscar trifecta. Maybe that’s how history is made: Sneaking up behind somebody else’s mistakes. We’ll have to wait and see if history’s signals have sunk deep enough into Hollywood’s teeming, bemused brain.
The cast and producers of “Moonlight” accept their award for best picture. the best supporting actor prize won by Mahershala Ali for playing the gangster, who takes the baffled young pro-
Emma Stone accepts the best actress Oscar for her role in ‘La La Land’
is what led to the best picture award being announced twice; first as a mistake, then as a correction. At the center of it all was Warren Beatty, who proved to have impeccable comic- timing without trying to be funny. Let’s see if we can piece this together: Beatty and Faye Dunaway, his co-star from the 50-year-old classic “Bonnie and Clyde,” were given the honor of presenting the climactic award. As the 79-year-old Beatty opened the envelope, he seemed to have a senior moment, nervously grinning, visibly struggling with whatever was on the card. At that
lected several Oscars, including Stone’s and a best director prize for Damien Chazelle. Chaos ensued. The cast and crew of “La La Land” took the stage and in what seemed like seconds, the correct envelope found its way to the stage and a stunned, but gracious cast and crew of “La La Land” gave way to a stunned, yet joyous cast and crew of “Moonlight.” Up until its strange ending, this year’s Oscar ceremony had already been an above-average clutter of topical humor and sincerely noteworthy moments: the first Muslim actor to win an Academy Award; “The White
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Ashgar Farhadi, boycotting the ceremony in protest of Trump’s Travel ban before winning Best Foreign Language Film; and Jimmy Kimmel mocking the President’s
ACTING WINNERS * Casey Affleck – best actor, Manchester by the Sea * Emma Stone – best actress, La La Land * Mahershala Ali – best supporting actor, Moonlight * Viola Davis – best supporting actress, Fences
The best supporting actor prize was won by Mahershala Ali