Within the two months of January and February, all the hard work within the acting industry comes to a test: winning the Screen Actor’s Guild Awards, the Golden Globes, and the notorious Oscars. The public crave this season for many reasons: it may be the thrill of seeing their favorite movie win, hearing the winner’s tear-jerking speech, or simply observing the red-carpet fashion of Hollywood’s biggest names.

But of course, like every year, there is always a shocker. For example, Denzel Washington took home the award for “Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role” at the SAG Awards for Fences; therefore, people were stunned at how he didn’t take home “Best Actor” at the Academy Awards. The last time an actor won the SAG award but didn’t win the Oscar was 10 years ago, so the Oscars came as quite the surprise to many viewers. Furthermore, Aaron Taylor-Johnson won “Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in any Motion Picture” for Nocturnal Animals at the Golden Globes, despite the prediction that Mahershala Ali was expected to win for his performance in Moonlight. Still, Ali won the Academy Award for “Best Supporting Actor.”

However, there were definitely some winners that were unsurprising, such as Emma Stone winning the SAG Award for “Outstanding Performance by an Female Actor in a Leading Role”, the Golden Globe Award for “Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy”, and lastly the Academy Award for “Best Actress.” Stone collected these trophies for her performance in La La Land. Moreover, Viola Davis won the SAG Award for “Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role”, the Golden Globe Award for “Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in any Motion Picture”, and the Academy Award for “Best Supporting Actress” all for her performance in Fences, ending the awards season with a moving speech at the Oscars.

One other award for the books was “Best Director” at the Oscars. It was given to Damien Chazelle, the director of La La Land. So far, Chazelle is the youngest recipient of “Best Director” at age 32.

Lastly, the public has gone nuts over one incident that occurred at the end of the Oscars. A single question probably ran through all the minds of the viewers: how on earth did Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway end up saying the wrong name for the “Best Picture” award? The big award is always announced at the end of the Oscars to amp up the anticipation from the crowd. This award provides ultimate satisfaction and glory to the cast and crew because it essentially means that every little edit in the film was worth it. This year, Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway definitely shocked the crowd. Beatty looked frazzled at the card as he stood before the crowd, but Dunaway snatched it out of his hands and read, “La La Land.” Everyone cheered, clapped and some even cried.

Suddenly, a stage manager ran across and Jimmy Kimmel came out trying to stop whomever was giving their speech. Confusion spread across everyone’s faces. Did La La Land not win? Did something go wrong? Yes, there was definitely a mistake; Moonlight won and La La Land didn’t. So this is what happened: the staff in charge of handing out the envelopes to the readers always make two cards per award, in case one goes missing. They mistakenly handed Beatty the extra card for “Best Actress” because the card he had said “Emma Stone – La La Land.” Because of this, Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway unknowingly pulled a Steve Harvey during the 2015 Miss Universe pageant. Nevertheless, cast and crew of Moonlight received their well-deserved award and the cast of La La Land congratulated them on the stage. Overall, the 2017 awards season was a dramatic yet glorious success!