Faye Dunaway got tough handling over her lack of apology on her now-legendary Oscars flub — announcing the wrong Best Picture. In her first public comments on the miscue, she told NBC’s Lester Holt she felt guilty.
“He paused,” Dunaway recalled. “He looked over at me. I finally said: ‘You’re impossible.’ I thought he was joking.”
She told Holt she realized something was wrong when she heard a loud voice from the left — “No, you didn’t win,” NBC News said.
“I thought, I could have done something, surely. Why didn’t I see Emma Stone’s name on the top of the card? But, you know, I was dealing with Warren and his charming manner, and I was trying to hurry him up and trying to get the award, because the show was running late. So I didn’t notice it.”
When she later asked Beatty why he gave her the wrong card, “He said, ‘Well, I — y —,’ I don’t know what his answer is.”
On The Ringer, Andrew Gruttadaro said the 76-year-old movie legend deserved a round of applause.
“Not because she made a good apology — it’s actually terrible, not even classifiable as one — but because she expertly evaded any and all culpability while still giving off the appearance of genuine repentance.
“This is just like how she let Warren Beatty fumble over an impromptu apology while elegantly receding into the background, only in interview form. Faye Dunaway is a publicity ninja.”