BBC Apologizes for Captioning Viola Davis Grammys Image With ‘Beyoncé’s Biggest Night’

The BBC made quite the faux pas in their coverage of The Grammys. As Deadline reported, the BBC shared an image of Viola Davis from January’s Golden Globes alongside a headline identifying her as Beyonce. The news organization subsequently issued an apology for the mistake. 

During the BBC’s coverage of the Grammys on Sunday night, they shared a photo of Davis with a headline that read, “Beyoncé’s Big Night.” The segment soon moved on to the next image, but the damage was done. BBC News shared a statement on Twitter and mentioned that the error “fell below the BBC’s usual standards.” Their statement continued, “We apologise for the mistake last night when our news channels briefly showed a photograph of Viola Davis from January’s Golden Globes alongside a headline about Beyoncé at yesterday’s Grammys.”

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While the BBC did apologize, one journalist from the news organization said that it wasn’t exactly a mistake. They claimed that it was a part of a “sequence about the other Grammy winners,” which is why it was referred to as “Beyoncé’s big night.” Their tweet appears to have since been deleted. Regardless, both Davis and Beyonce walked away with Grammys by the end of the night. Davis accepted a Grammy award for Best Audiobook, Narration, and Storytelling Recording for her memoir, Finding Me. As a result of this win, she achieved EGOT status.

Of course, as the BBC even noted, Beyonce did have a “big night” at the Grammys. On Sunday night, she became the most-awarded artist in Grammys history with 32 wins, according to CNN. Beyonce achieved that feat when she won the award for Best Dance/Electronic Album for Renaissance. Many were hoping that she would also walk away with the win for Album of the Year, but it ended up going to Harry Styles’ Harry’s House. Beyonce’s husband, Jay-Z, even spoke out about why he felt as though his wife’s album should have won the award during an interview with Tidal’s chief content officer, Elliott Wilson. 

“Look what it’s done to the culture,” Jay-Z said during the interview, which was conducted prior to Sunday night’s show. “Look how the energy of the world moved. They play her whole album in the club. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen that. The whole entire joint—like, everything?! Every remix is amazing. Everyone’s inspired. It has inspired the world. Every remix is better than the other one.”