Moonlight wins Best Picture Oscar after historic mixup

Who says the Oscars are boring? It was all going pretty much to script last night. Almost all the awards went as predicted. And when Hollywood legends Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway took to the stage to present Best Picture, this was shaping up to be one of the most boring Oscars in history. But then came the twist worthy of a Hollywood movie.

Beatty opened the envelope. He paused. He did a double take. He looked in the envelope again. “For Best Picture…” Beatty began, before pausing again and looking in bemusement towards his Bonnie and Clyde co-star.

“You’re awful,” said Dunaway, clearly thinking Beatty was making a bad joke. She took the card off him and read out the title within: “La La Land.”

The musical’s producers and cast, including Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling, took to the stage in celebration and began speechifying. Something was clearly amiss in the background, however, as people milled around onstage passing whispers and envelopes to one another.

It was eventually left to La La Land’s producer Jordan Horowitz – who’d already delivered his acceptance speech – to take control of the situation. "There's been a mistake," he said. "Moonlight won." We're used to the Oscars picking the wrong Best Picture, but we've never seen anything like this.

As gasps and murmurs spread across the hall, Horowitz confirmed that “this is not a joke, Moonlight won,” and flashed the real Best Picture envelope at the camera to show clearly the winner was Barry Jenkins’ gorgeous coming of age film.

As the real winners made their way to the stage, host Jimmy Kimmel tried to make light of the colossal error. “I knew I would screw this show up,” he said. “I really did.”

Moonlight’s director, Barry Jenkins, was clearly stunned: “Even in my dreams, this could not be true. But to hell with dreams, I’m done with it, because this is true.”

Beatty sheepishly returned to the front of the stage to explain that the card he’d been handed and had given him pause had read, “Emma Stone, La La Land.” It turned out he’d been handed the Best Actress envelope instead.

Despite Moonlight’s Best Picture win, La La Land was the biggest winner on the night, picking up six awards, including Best Actress for Emma Stone and Best Director for Damien Chazelle, who, at 32, is the youngest person ever to win the award.

Moonlight ended the night with three wins from its eight nominations. As well as Best Picture, Barry Jenkins' acclaimed drama took home Best Supporting Actor (Mahershala Ali) and Best Adapted Screenplay.

Watch the full debacle in the player below, followed by the full list of winners and nominees.

Oscars 2017 winners – winners shown in bold:

Best Picture

Moonlight
Arrival
Fences
Hacksaw Ridge
Hell Or High Water
Hidden Figures
La La Land
Lion
Manchester By The Sea

Best director

Damien Chazelle (La La Land)
Denis Villeneuve (Arrival)
Mel Gibson (Hacksaw Ridge)
Kenneth Lonergan (Manchester By The Sea)
Barry Jenkins (Moonlight)

Best actor

Casey Affleck (Manchester By The Sea)
Andrew Garfield (Hacksaw Ridge)
Ryan Gosling (La La Land)
Viggo Mortensen (Captain Fantastic)
Denzel Washington (Fences)

Best actress

Emma Stone (La La Land)
Isabelle Huppert (Elle)
Ruth Negga (Loving)
Natalie Portman (Jackie)
Meryl Streep (Florence Foster Jenkins)

Best supporting actor

Mahershala Ali (Moonlight)
Jeff Bridges (Hell Or High Water)
Lucas Hedges (Manchester By The Sea)
Dev Patel (Lion)
Michael Shannon (Nocturnal Animals)

Best supporting actress

Viola Davis (Fences)
Naomie Harris (Moonlight)
Nicole Kidman (Lion)
Octavia Spencer (Hidden Figures)
Michelle Williams (Manchester By The Sea)

Best animated feature

Zootopia
Kubo and the Two Strings
Moana
My Life as a Zucchini
The Red Turtle<

Best song

La La Land – City of Stars
La La Land – Audition
Moana – How Far I'll Go
Jim: The James Foley Story – The Empty Chair
Trolls – Can't Stop the Feeling

Best foreign film

The Salesman (Iran)
A Man Called Ove (Sweden)
Land of Mine (Denmark)
Tanna (Australia)
Toni Erdmann (Germany)

Best cinematography

La La Land
Arrival
Lion
Moonlight
Silence

Documentary feature

OJ: Made In America
Fire at Sea
I Am Not Your Negro
Life, Animated
13th

Documentary short 

The White Helmets
4.1 Miles
Joe’s Violin
Watani: My Homeland
Extremis

Best Costume Design

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Colleen Atwood)
Allied (Joanna Johnston)
Florence Foster Jenkins (Consolata Boyle)
Jackie (Madeline Fontaine)
La La Land (Mary Zophres)

Best Original Score

La La Land (Justin Hurwitz)
Jackie (Mica Levi)
Lion (Dustin O'Halloran, Hauschka)
Moonlight (Nicholas Britell)
Passengers (Thomas Newman)

Best Sound Editing

Arrival
Deepwater Horizon
Hacksaw Ridge
La La Land
Sully

Best Sound Mixing

Hacksaw Ridge
Arrival
La La Land
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
13 Hours

Best Production Design

La La Land (Sandy Reynolds-Wasco, David Wasco)
Arrival (Patrice Vermette)
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Stuart Craig)
Hail, Caesar!
Passengers (Guy Hendrix Dyas)

Best Original Screenplay

Manchester by the Sea (Kenneth Lonergan)
Hell or High Water (Taylor Sheridan)
La La Land (Damien Chazelle)
The Lobster (Yorgos Lanthimos, Efthymis Filippou)
20th Century Women (Mike Mills)

Best Adapted Screenplay

Moonlight (Barry Jenkins, Tarell Alvin McRaney)Arrival (Eric Heisserer)
Fences (August Wilson)
Hidden Figures (Allison Schroeder, Theodore Melfi)
Lion (Luke Davies)

Best Animated Short

Piper (Pixar)
Blind Vaysha (National Film Board of Canada)
Borrowed Time (Quorum Films)
Pear Cider and Cigarettes (Massive Swerve Studios and Passion Pictures Animation)
Pearl (Google Spotlight Stories/Evil Eye Pictures)

Best Film Editing

Hacksaw Ridge (John Gilbert)
Arrival (Joe Walker)
Hell or High Water (Jake Roberts)
La La Land (Tom Cross)
Moonlight (Joi McMillon, Nat Sanders)

Best Visual Effects

The Jungle Book
Deepwater Horizon
Doctor Strange
Kubo and the Two Strings
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Best Makeup and Hairstyling

Suicide Squad
A Man Called Ove
Star Trek Beyond