By Gemma Peplow, culture and entertainment reporter
We had a big surprise earlier when a tie was announced – The Singers and Two People Exchanging Saliva have shared the award for best live-action short film.
In the 98-year history of the Academy Awards, this has only happened six times before.
The first was in 1932, when Fredric March (Dr Jekyll And Mr Hyde) and Wallace Beery (The Champ) were deemed to have tied for best actor.
However, the Oscars says this wasn’t a true tie as March actually had one more vote, but rules at the time stated that if a second-place nominee came within three votes of the winner, they would both win.
The rules have since been changed to honour only an exact match.
So the first true tie came in 1949, when A Chance To Live and So Much For So Little tied in the documentary short category.
There has only ever been one true in the acting categories – in 1968, when Katharine Hepburn (The Lion In The Winter) and Barbra Streisand (Funny Girl) shared the gong for best actress.
In 1986, there was a tie between documentaries Artie Shaw: Time Is All You’ve Got and Down And Out In America, and the next one came in 1994, when Franz Kafka’s It’s a Wonderful Life and Trevor tied in the live action short category.
Before tonight’s tie, the most recent was in 2012, when Skyfall and Zero Dark Thirty were both recognised for sound editing.
