Michelle Williams has addressed one of the biggest Oscar upsets in history: when Crash beat Brokeback Mountain to Best Picture.
Ang Lee’s drama about the romantic relationship between two male cowboys was the strong favourite to win in 2005, but in the ceremony’s final moments, Paul Haggis’ drama was named the night’s big winner.
Willaims, who appears in new series Dying for Sex, starred in Brokeback Mountain alongside Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal and Anne Hathaway and, 20 years on from its surprise loss, she has shared her candid thoughts on the chosen victor.
Appearing on Watch What Happens with Andy Cohen, Williams brutally shut down the ensemble drama, which is strongly considered one of the worst Best Picture winners of all time, by asking: “What was Crash?”
She reflected on the importance of Brokeback Mountain, revealing that, during the junkets, people would cry because of the film’s power.
“People were so open about it,” she said. “And the, you know, I just remember doing the junket. You don’t really get an opportunity to see a lot of grown men cry. And it was really, that was the moment that I think that we all knew that it was going to be special to people.”
When Jack Nicholson announced Crash as the winner of Best Picture, he was seen to mouth the word “whoa” in apparent surprise.
The 2004 film, starring Matt Dillon, Sandra Bullock, Thandiwe Newton and Don Cheadle, has been criticised for the clunky way it explores race issues in Los Angeles.
Haggis, who wrote and directed the film, acknowledged in 2015 that his film was not “the best of the year”, stating: “You shouldn’t ask me what the best film of the year was because I wouldn’t be voting for Crash, only because I saw the artistry that was in the other films.”
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Other nominees included George Clooney’s Good Night, and Good Luck – a play adaptation of which has just premiered on Broadway – Capote, starring Phillip Seymour Hoffman, and Steven Spielberg’s Munich.
While Brokeback Mountain didn’t win Best Picture, Lee took home the prize for Best Director. However, the filmmaker told IndieWire in 2024 that prejudice among the Academy voters at that time might have played a part in the film’s loss
He also recalled the moment the film lost Best Picture. “I got my award, which was [second to] last to the big one, and I was walking off the stage, they called me down, and said, stay here. That’s your mark. Everybody assumes you will win, so stay at that mark.
“Right next to the stage was the curtain. The next was Best Picture. Stay here, just stay here. I saw Jack Nicholson, his profile, he opened the envelope, and I go, ‘Oh my god, oh my god.’ It took like 10 seconds before he announced, and then he went, ‘Crash.’”
