If you're one of the people who joked that someone lost their job after "Envelopegate" at the Oscars Sunday night, you were right.
Cheryl Boone Isaacs, president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, announced Wednesday, March 1, that the accountants responsible for the Best Picture envelope blunder won't be returning to any future Academy Awards ceremonies. The accountants for PricewaterhouseCoopers have been identified as Brian Cullinan and Martha Ruiz. Boone Isaacs felt that the mistake took away from what she otherwise called, "a most beautiful, beautiful, wonderful evening."
"And what angered me, I would say, in these last couple days is [the focus on] this 90 seconds and moving to the side the brilliance of the day," she said.
In an exclusive interview with the Associated Press, Boone Isaacs shared that although Cullinan was the person who handed the wrong envelope to Warren Beatty, both accountants deviated from protocol and did not act quickly enough to correct the error.
"They have one job to do. One job to do," she said. "Obviously there was a distraction."
The distraction may have been Cullinan tweeting a picture of Emma Stone, shortly before handing Warren Beatty the wrong envelope. The tweet has since been deleted. The academy is currently examining and retooling the protocol for the awards show to prevent a repeat of the incident. "It never happened before and we never are going to have it happen again," Boone Isaacs said.
After releasing an initial apology to the cast and crew of both La La Land and Moonlight, the academy refrained from releasing a full statement because they wanted to have a better idea of how the mistake happened. "We wanted to say something right away, but we also didn't want to misspeak," Boone Isaacs said.
However, Warren Beatty and his co-presenter Faye Dunaway as well as Jimmy Kimmel and the artists of La La Land and Moonlight did earn Boone Isaacs' praise. She said she believed they handled the situation incredibly gracefully and through the unfortunate mishap, demonstrated the best of Hollywood which Boone Isaacs said was "a camaraderie and respect for each other."
Despite the disappointing occurrence, Boone Isaacs said she was pleased that the public still takes an interest in the Oscars.
"The Oscars are truly special, to such a degree that everyone has an opinion about it, but I'm fine with that," she said. "I love that we're in the conversation. Let's just make sure that, certainly this year, the conversation is about celebrating a fantastic year in the film business and a fantastic show."