Sam Smith had the best of intentions, but when picking up his Oscar for Best Original Song for "Spectre," he misquoted Ian McKellen and got shaken and stirred by the Internet.

"I read an article a few months ago by Sir Ian McKellen and he said that no openly gay man had ever won an Oscar, and if this is the case, even if it isn't the case, I want to dedicate this to the LGBT community all around the world," Smith said in his speech. "I stand here tonight as a proud gay man, and I hope we can all stand together as equals one day."

Backstage, Smith reacted to winning on a night of diversity, during a year when there was an increase in LGBT visibility with films like "Carol" and "The Danish Girl": "It means the world to me. When I read the Ian McKellen piece, I was just bowled over by it, and I wanted to take this opportunity to show how much I care about my community. In the past in my career, people have said at the beginning that I didn't and stuff, and I just wanted to make it clear how much I truly do care about the LGBT community."

It was a moving speech, and a worthy sentiment, but Smith was far from the first openly gay man to win an Oscar. As The Hollywood Reporter noted, "Elton John, Dustin Lance Black, Howard Ashman, and Scott Rudin were all openly gay when they accepted their Oscars. John and Ashman both won best original song Oscars, as have fellow openly gay artists Melissa Etheridge (in 2007 for 'I Need To Wake Up' from An Inconvenient Truth) and Stephen Sondheim."

Sir Ian, being simply The Best at all times, kept things positive when gently correcting Smith on his own original quote:


Smith responded to McKellen:


However, some viewers were more frustrated with Smith, and called him out for being oblivious of history. Oscar winner Dustin Lance Black issued a couple of sharp tweets:


Smith replied to Black, and further tried to bring attention back to the intentions of his speech:


Ultimately, whether from being sick of the online chatter or just to celebrate privately, Smith announced that he was temporarily stepping away from Twitter:


Sometimes it's best just to leave the Twitterverse to itself. Hopefully he's now enjoying his moment in peaceand quiet -- or out partying with Sir Ian McKellen.

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