Exactly, it was abrupt, but it never felt dickish, to me, it felt like he was trying to stop the nonsense and let Moonlight know it wasn’t a joke or a bit. Especially when he followed up with “I’m proud to give this to my friends from Moonlight.” I think he just felt the urgency and went with it.

agreed. He had clearly taken over the ship, people were in disbelief, he grabbed the proof. I don’t think it was anything other than trying to fix the situation as quickly as possible.

Indeed. Good trait for a Producer. Guess he found his calling.

Just catching up on all of this now. ER doc here. This is EXACTLY how I get when things go bad. I saw him getting the shit done while everyone else was dithering around freaking out, and hugging everyone from Moonlight once the situation was handled and the real winners got up there. You’re totally right. (And thanks…

I saw Horowitz in a perfect balance of seethingly pissy and dimplomatically gracious. And given how much a win would have meant to him and his team, the seethingly pissy was perfectly justified (regardless of personal views on the relative merits of the film.)

Also, there are tons of sourpus reaction photos from the audience. I think he was afraid that people thought they/the oscars were playing a joke on moonlight. I think that’s why he insisted “this is not a joke.” When you’ve got a notoriously unfunny comedian hosting it is a fair fear. I don’t get the hate on him, he…

If we take another look at the video, the category is in tiny type at the bottom in a light gold font. Ten bucks says neither Faye nor Warren could read that without reading glasses.

Exactly. He acted like a guy who can get a movie made in the extreme dysfunction that is Hollywood. And I think his statements since have shown class - not blaming, all the spotlight on Moonlight, and his happiness for a fellow producer who had an even bigger hill to climb to get a movie made.

Yeah, I thought given the situation Horowitz handled it with amazing grace. As someone who wants to win an Oscar I can’t imagine how painful that was.

Thank you! And he delivered it with passion—rather than self-pity. Like, “You guys deserve this.” No one else was stepping up.

I didn’t even know that was Horowitz! I thought it was some Oscars official who came out on the stage to clean up the mess.

The venom in Rich’s post is perplexing. Nothing he posted reflects what I saw happening on the stage last night. I saw people doing the best they could, in a very confusing, unorganized moment, with the pressure of being on live TV and in front of an auditorium of people. Rich saw entitled straight white men being…

I agree, Horowitz did as well as anyone could on the spot in a situation like that. I think it only looked like some of the La La Land people were lingering because they were passing the news person to person, on stage, in front of everybody.

100% agree with this. Nothing more to say.

This is a quality assessment of how that played out. It doesn’t help that Beatty seems to have become less articulate in his old age, and I think Dunaway interpreted his behavior as goofing around the way it often happens.

“Feel free to go after Kimmel for suggesting that everyone go home with a participation award (the fuck?) but Horowitz dealt with that situation with class.”

“We want these sorts of people around when buildings catch on fire, high-pressure salesmen corner you, or the Best Picture Oscar is in the process of going to the wrong fucking movie.”

Yeah. He was pissed. Not at Moonlight, not that they did not win, but at the mix up. That poor stage manager. Ugg...would not want to be that person.

Absolutely. I’m sure once he got off stage he had a whole range of emotions, but in that moment he knew exactly how to handle the situation.