When Chadwick Boseman didn’t win the Oscar for Best Actor at the 93rd Annual Academy Awards, many were disappointed. Boseman lost to Anthony Hopkins who won for his role in The Father. 

In an interview with The Los Angeles Times, one of the producers of the 2021 Oscars, filmmaker Steven Soderbergh, gave a bit of insight behind the “snubbing” of Boseman and making the Best Actor category last instead of Best Picture.

Typically the Best Actor category is reserved for around the middle of the show. However in January, the order was changed prior to the nominations being released, says Soderbergh.

“It’s our belief — that I think is not unfounded — that actors’ speeches tend to be more dramatic than producers’ speeches,” Soderbergh explained. “And so we thought it might be fun to mix it up, especially if people didn’t know that was coming. So that was always part of the plan.”

Soderbergh told the paper that he and his team “doubled down” on ending the awards with the Best Actor category after finding out Boseman was in the running.

“When the nominations came out and there was even the possibility that Chadwick could win posthumously, our feeling was if he were to win and his widow were to speak on his behalf, there would be nowhere to go after that,” Soderbergh stated. “So we stuck with it.”

Viewers assumed the Oscars were planning for Boseman to win thus giving the ceremony an emotionally high ending. However, when Hopkins won and could not be present for the acceptance due to Zoom restrictions, viewers made their opinions known.

“I said if there was even the sliver of a chance that he would win and that his widow would speak, then we were operating under the fact that was the end of the show,” Soderbergh explained further. “So it wasn’t like we assumed it would, but if there was even a possibility that it would happen, then you have to account for that. That would have been such a shattering moment, that to come back after that would have been just impossible.”