Last night’s Oscars saw some historic wins, including the Best Picture award, which went to Moonlight. It’s the first Best Picture award to go to an LGBT film with an all-black cast, but a production snafu falsely awarded the honor to La La Land. Yet La La Land producers graciously allowed Moonlight to accept the award it won, in spite of the error.
It takes a certain kind of bravery to cede an Oscar that isn’t even yours, but the La La Land producers did just that.
“I don’t know, something just came over me where I decided not to be a total fucking monster,” producer Jordan Horowitz says. “Of course the thought crossed my mind to just take the statue and run. It’s nice to know that’s what everyone expected me to do.”
It’s a near-charitable act for accidental winners to accept a mistake and not completely ignore the Academy. Incredible!
La La Land was the favorite to win, yet a sweep at the Golden Globes garnered backlash from many who criticized the industry’s inclination to reward rote white narratives over innovative, diverse stories. Speaking of that, you probably have a lot of questions about Moonlight, but buckle up, cause we’re gonna keep telling you about La La Land.
It must not have been easy for La La Land to have to cede just one square inch of the acclaim white films are routinely awarded for conventional, less inspired stories, but it was very big of them. So big, in fact, that no one should make any mention of the producer who gave an acceptance speech after learning he hadn’t won. Didn’t he deserve that much? After all, who can imagine a greater honor at the Oscars than being a white person willing to let black people succeed when deserved?
In some ways, La La Land producers’ willingness to perform the only appropriate behavior in that situation is more impressive than Moonlight’s win. Maybe La La Land should win an Oscar just for being a good sport!
