--- title: Moonlight, La La Land and What an Oscars Mix-Up Feels Like description: A wrong 2017 Oscars envelope led 'La La Land' to be named Best Picture when 'Moonlight' won. Something similar happened in 1934, too. canonical: https://time.com/4683820/la-la-land-moonlight-oscars-1934/ author: Olivia B. Waxman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-02-27T16:45:08.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:41:26.016Z article:section: History og:title: Moonlight, La La Land and What an Oscars Mix-Up Feels Like og:description: The 'Moonlight'-vs.-'La La Land' mix-up wasn't the first og:url: https://time.com/4683820/la-la-land-moonlight-oscars-1934/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt499b9887c8342724/6988bc1e7cdbac6431d57487/89th-academy-awards-_waxm.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Jordan Horowitz, Warren Beatty og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Moonlight, La La Land and What an Oscars Mix-Up Feels Like twitter:description: The 'Moonlight'-vs.-'La La Land' mix-up wasn't the first twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt499b9887c8342724/6988bc1e7cdbac6431d57487/89th-academy-awards-_waxm.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # What It Feels Like to Suddenly Realize You Didn’t Actually Win That Oscar  by [Olivia B. Waxman](https://time.com/author/olivia-b-waxman/)  ## Olivia B. Waxman Staff Writer Feb 27, 2017 4:45 PM UTC  Jordan Horowitz, producer of "La La Land," shows the envelope revealing "Moonlight" as the true winner of best picture at the Oscars on Feb. 26, 2017, at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles. Jordan Horowitz, producer of "La La Land," shows the envelope revealing "Moonlight" as the true winner of best picture at the Oscars on Feb. 26, 2017, at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.Chris Pizzello—Invision/AP  by [Olivia B. Waxman](https://time.com/author/olivia-b-waxman/)  ## Olivia B. Waxman Staff Writer Feb 27, 2017 4:45 PM UTC It seemed as though some organizers of the 89th [Academy Awards ](http://time.com/4683716/oscars-2017-best-picture-mistake-theories/)must have been in “la la land” themselves on Sunday night, when presenter Warren Beatty [opened the envelope](http://time.com/4683402/oscars-2017-recap-review/?xid=homepage) that was supposed to contain the name of the Best Picture winner and found that it held Best Actress Emma Stone’s name, leading fellow presenter Faye Dunaway to [mistakenly](http://time.com/money/4683710/oscars-mixup-pricewaterhousecoopers-moonlight-lala-land/) declare _La La Land_ the winner when _Moonlight_ had really won. While some critics have called the gaffe the [“greatest”](http://screenertv.com/television/2017-oscars-best-picture-accidentally-goes-la-la-land-instead-of-moonlight/) in Oscars history, it is not the first to occur during the presentation of one of the top awards of the night. One such mix-up up occurred in 1934, during the presentation of the Best Director category at the sixth Academy Awards ceremony. Host Will Rogers announced the winner with a simple declaration: “Come up and get it, Frank!” Frank Capra, who had been nominated for _Lady for a Day,_ started walking toward the stage — but Rogers had meant Frank Lloyd, who directed _Cavalcade._ Capra described what that felt like in his autobiography[ _The Name Above the Title_:](https://books.google.com/books?id=x%5FE09IWRomMC&pg=PA154&lpg=PA154&dq=%22come+up+and+get+it+frank%22&source=bl&ots=31zmkINX8r&sig=udKv4YWgKyV%5FYHN5XLtq1sVGwfM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwidnYGburDSAhWESCYKHaRjCnMQ6AEIPDAG#v=onepage&q=%22come%20up%20and%20get%20it%20frank%22&f=false) --- > “” --- The March 26, 1934, issue of [TIME magazine reported](http://time.com/vault/issue/1934-03-26/page/22/) that Frank Lloyd had won for _Cavalcade,_ but did not mention the incident. That lack of coverage is a reminder that in one crucial way the 1934 mistake is not a perfect parallel to the 2017 blooper, given it happened nearly two decades before TV broadcasts of the ceremony started with the [25th Academy Awards in 1953](http://time.com/3712109/television-changed-oscars/). In other words, Capra’s shame among his peers may have been great, but the world was not watching it happen. The decision to televise the Oscars had the effect for some observers at the time of making the glamorous parade of winners look more like “a supermarket mob scene,” as [TIME reflected four years later](http://time.com/vault/issue/1957-04-08/page/94/). On the small screen the stars looked a little more human than they had before. And, as when entertainer Sammy Davis Jr. was handed [the wrong envelope to present a music Oscar](http://time.com/4683668/oscars-2017-wrong-envelope-lala-land-moonlight/) in 1964, sometimes they — like the presenters on Sunday night — that meant they looked too human for comfort. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4683820/la-la-land-moonlight-oscars-1934/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4683820/la-la-land-moonlight-oscars-1934/"},"headline":"What It Feels Like to Suddenly Realize You Didn’t Actually Win That Oscar","datePublished":"2017-02-27T16:45:08.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:41:26.016Z","description":"The Moonlight-vs.-La La Land mix-up wasn't the first","url":"https://time.com/4683820/la-la-land-moonlight-oscars-1934/","keywords":["movies","Newsfeed"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt499b9887c8342724/6988bc1e7cdbac6431d57487/89th-academy-awards-_waxm.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Olivia B. 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