As you've likely heard 100 or more times by now, Hollywood's annual night of grace and splendor devolved into total amateur hour during the presentation for its final (and most prestigious) award on Sunday night. Because of that goof of epic proportions, Moonlight director Barry Jenkins wasn't able to give the acceptance speech he had prepared prior to his film winning Best Picture.
Instead, in the moment, an understandably shocked Jenkins settled for an impromptu speech. "Very clearly, even in my dreams this could not be true," he said. "But to hell with dreams! I'm done with it, because this is true. Oh, my goodness." He also thanked the people from La La Land before passing the mic to producer Adele Romanski.
On Tuesday, he revealed to Entertainment Weekly the actual speech he wanted to share. Here it is:
"[Moonlight playwright Tarell Alvin McCraney] and I are this kid. We are Chiron. And you don’t think that kid grows up to be nominated for eight Academy Awards. It’s not a dream he’s allowed to have. I still feel that way. I didn’t think this was possible. But now I look at other people looking at me and if I didn’t think it was possible, how are they going to? But now it’s happened. So what I think of possibility, let’s take it off the table. The thing has happened."
And so, instead of delivering his speech in front of a theater full of his peers, as well as a worldwide audience watching from their living rooms, he has to settle for releasing it a couple days later so it can be read by people casually checking their phones and/or going to the bathroom. It's not quite as eloquent this way, but he's still got his Oscar. Anyway, feel free to blame this all on the accountants/Faye Dunaway/Warren Beatty/the Academy/Emma Stone/whomever.
