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After a massive mistake at the Oscars awards this week, the two PwC auditors in charge of the academy votes and envelopes will not be working with the awards again.
Brian Cullinan and Martha Ruiz not returning to the role was confirmed by the President of the American Film Academy, Cheryl Boone Isaac, said on Wednesday. PwC has counted Oscars votes successfully for 83 years, making this one of their largest mistakes in history.
Cullinan and Ruiz were responsible for counting the votes as soon as the Academy polls close, compiling a winners list, memorising the winners, sealing the envelopes and giving them to the awards presenters.
The debacle, which caused huge furore, saw Cullinan hand Warren Beatty the wrong best picture envelope during Sunday night’s ceremony. This resulted in La La Land being wrongly announced as the winner rather than Moonlight.
Tim Ryan, US Chairman and senior Partner at PwC, told Variety magazine “There’s a stack for the back-ups and the ones that are not the back-ups and he [Cullinan] took from the wrong stack. He added that Cullinan, the Chairman of PwC’s US Board, was left feeling “very, very terrible and horrible” and repeated the firm’s apologies for the historic mix-up.
Mistakes are part and parcel of being human, but the scale to which this mistake was made cost both Cullinan and Ruiz their jobs, as well as denting PwC’s reputation.
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To see another article on this issue plus a list of other famous mix-ups, visit HR grapevine via this link: https://www.hrgrapevine.com/content/article/news-2017-03-02-auditors-responsible-for-oscar-envelope-mix-up-wont-work-with-awards-again