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2017·The platform era·shocking

The La La Land Oscars mix-up

The wrong film won Best Picture live on air, and the correction happened on stage in front of everybody.

You might remember it as envelopegate, Moonlight Best Picture announcement

It happened on television

This Moment began as a television broadcast, not as a video upload. Originally published on broadcast.

The story

What this was

At the 89th Academy Awards on 26 February 2017, Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway were handed the wrong envelope and announced La La Land as Best Picture. Its producers were partway through their acceptance speeches before the mistake was established on stage, the cast of Moonlight were brought up, and the correct winner was declared in front of a live worldwide audience.

It first appeared in 2017, during the platform era.

It is the single most-screenshotted two minutes of live television of the social-media era: an unfolding error that everybody could see happening, in real time, with the participants' faces available in close-up. The reaction was not really about the films — it was about watching an enormously formal institution fail in public with nowhere to cut away to.

The accountancy firm responsible changed its procedures and the two partners involved were removed from the assignment. "Envelopegate" became shorthand for any live administrative catastrophe, and it is the reference point every awards show has been measured against since.

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Nothing here is claimed to be the first publication of this Moment, because the first publication was not an upload. This Moment began as a television broadcast, not as a video upload. Originally published on broadcast.

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What happens
At the 89th Academy Awards on 26 February 2017, Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway were handed the wrong envelope and announced La La Land as Best Picture. Its producers were partway through their acceptance speeches before the mistake was established on stage, the cast of Moonlight were brought up, and the correct winner was declared in front of a live worldwide audience.
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