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5 things from Oscars 2016 everyone will be talking about

Cape Town – The 88th annual Academy Awards took place on Sunday night (Monday morning SA time) at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

While you might have been sleeping we stayed up to make sure we didn’t miss a thing. So to make sure everyone is up to date we’ve quickly put together a list of 5 things that happened at the Oscars that everyone will be talking about.

White People’s Choice Awards

Academy Awards host Chris Rock hardly shied away from the topic of diversity in his opening monologue, diving right in by calling the Oscars the "White People's Choice Awards" and noting the number of black faces shown in the opening montage of film clips.

The second-time Oscar host said in his monologue that if hosts were nominated like people in the acting categories, people would be watching Neil Patrick Harris instead.

He talked about the pressure put on him not to host the awards following the diversity controversy. He said he wasn't going to quit because "the last thing I need is to lose another job to Kevin Hart".

But Rock hardly gave Hollywood a pass. He said Hollywood's racism is like sorority racism, where a girl is deemed "not Kappa material". And he said black actors should get the same opportunities as white actors — like Leonardo DiCaprio gets a great part every year.

Watch Chris' opening monologue here.


What…the…

Actress and Fox News personality Stacey Dash says she wants to bring a different kind of diversity to Hollywood — and that's why she participated in one of the oddest Oscar moments.

The former Clueless actress has attracted attention lately for her conservative viewpoints, including suggesting on Fox that there should not be a Black History Month. Dash, who is black, also spoke out against people complaining that the Oscars didn't reflect diversity.

She was jokingly introduced by host Chris Rock as director of the Oscar's minority outreach programme. Dash strode onstage to say "I cannot wait to help my people out. Happy Black History Month!"

The joke fell flat, perhaps because many people in the audience didn't understand the reference.

Dash explained online why she did it, saying ideological diversity is much harder to achieve in Hollywood.


Lady Gaga’s powerful performance

Lady Gaga led the Oscars in a rally against campus sexual assault, bringing together rape survivors who joined arms in solidarity.

The pop star, who recently has spoken out about being raped as a teenager, was introduced by Vice President Joe Biden who personally took part in Hollywood's biggest night to lend his voice to the cause.

Gaga, singing to a piano and occasionally stretching her arms out with emotion, performed Till It Happens To You which was nominated for the Oscar for best song for The Hunting Ground, a documentary about rape on campus.

Watch Lady Gaga's performance here.


Mad Max was the biggest winner

The night's most-awarded film went to neither Spotlight nor The Revenant. George Miller's post-apocalyptic chase film, Mad Max: Fury Road sped away with six awards in technical categories for editing, makeup, production design, sound editing, sound mixing and costume design.

Roundly acclaimed for its old-school craft, Miller's Mad Max was assured of becoming the evening's most awarded film.

"Us Mad Maxes are doing OK tonight," said editor Margaret Sixel, who's also Miller's wife. The flurry of wins brought a parade of Australian craftsmen onstage, including sound editor Mark Mangini, who celebrated with a loud expletive.


The winners and losers

The internet nearly went into meltdown when Leonardo DiCaprio, after being nominated for 5 Academy Awards during his career, finally walked away with the golden statuette. Leonardo won the Oscar for Best Actor for his role in The Revenant.

Apart from Leo’s win there were a few surprises and upsets among the winners list.

In an underdog win for a movie about an underdog profession, the newspaper drama Spotlight took best picture at a 88th Academy Awards.

Tom McCarthy's film about the Boston Globe's investigative reporting on sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests won over the favoured frontier epic The Revenant. McCarthy's well-crafted procedural, led by a strong ensemble cast, had lagged in the lead-up to the Oscars, losing ground to the flashier filmmaking of Alejandro Inarritu's film.

But Spotlight — an ode to the hard-nose, methodical work of a journalism increasingly seldom practiced — took the night's top honour despite winning only one other Oscar for McCarthy and Josh Singer's screenplay. Such a sparsely-awarded best picture winner hasn't happened since 1952's The Greatest Show On Earth.

There was another major surprise on Sunday. The supporting actor win for Mark Rylance over Sylvester Stallone drew gasps.

Stallone, nominated a second time 39 years later for the role of Rocky Balboa, had been expected to win his first acting Oscar for the Rocky sequel Creed. He instead lost to the famed stage actor who co-starred in Steven Spielberg's Bridge of Spies.

See all the 2016 Oscar winners here.

READ NEXT: 10 stunning images from the Oscars you have to see

(Sources: AP/AFP/Bang Showbiz. Photo: Getty Images)

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