ONE MISTAKE IS grabbing all the Oscars headlines, but there was another gaffe on show at last night’s ceremony involving the In Memoriam section.
At one part of the segment,which pays tribute to members of the industry who’ve died in the past year, the name “Janet Patterson” with the title “Costume Designer” flashed up on screen along with a picture of a woman.
While Janet Patterson is indeed deceased – she died in October 2015 – the picture used at the ceremony was of Jan Chapman, a film producer who is still alive.
The pair are both Australian, and even worked on the film The Piano together.
In an email to Variety, Chapman said that she was “devastated” at the use of her image instead of Patterson’s.
She said: “I was devastated by the use of my image in place of my great friend and long-time collaborator Janet Paterson.
I had urged her agency to check any photograph which might be used and understand that they were told that the Academy had it covered.
Another source of controversy from the In Memoriam segment was the omission of Garry Shandling, an American comedian best known for the Larry Sanders Show.
He had high profile cameos in films such as Zoolander, but was more well-known for his TV work.
Last night’s Oscars host Jimmy Kimmel said that Shandling’s performance when hosting the Emmys inspired his own style.
The In Memoriam section did feature, however, a tribute to the late-Bill Paxton, the Aliens and Twister star who died yesterday, aged 61.
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