Director, producer, writer, actor, and avid sports fan Spike Lee revealed the winner of the Cannes Palme d'Or earlier than planned this past weekend at the renowned film festival.
Spike Lee apologized on many occasions during and after the festival as he felt that he really dropped the ball by misinterpreting a question spoken to him in French.
"I have no excuses. I messed up. I'm a big sports fan. It's like the guy at the end of the game who misses a free throw. I messed up, as simple as that."
Spike was the jury president and his accidental announcement of the winner at the beginning of the closing ceremony caused quite a bit of confusion. Check out the clip below for some more details:
There have been quite a few mishaps on award shows over the years and this slip-up does not compare to say, the 2017 mistaken announcement of La La Landas the winner of best picture when in fact Moonlight had actually won.
Of course Spike Lee made sure to apologize profusely in press releases, to the Cannes Festival heads, and everyone else that was involved.
While the early announcement took some suspense out of the night, the winner of the Palme d'Or remains historic.
The film that Spike announced was Titane, a horror-thriller directed by Julia Ducournau. Ducournau winning is historic as she is only the second female filmmaker to win the top award in the festival's long 74 year-old history.
The director was also a fantastic sport about the entire mess-up as she said:
"I'm sorry, I keep shaking my head, is this real? I don't know why I'm speaking English right now because I'm French. This evening has been so perfect because it was not perfect.
Spike remains somewhat embarrassed by the whole thing and even poked fun at himself during the actual announcement, but Ducournau's acceptance was comical and exciting for everyone. The win was expected, but also a huge accomplishment to break the long-running streak of strictly male filmmakers winning.
Check out our other news on Spike Lee here. You can also watch the new ground-breaking film that is Titaneon Amazon now.
