The tweet was quickly deleted.
On a largely gaffe-free Emmy awards night, the Television Academy almost got away with a social media snafu that saw it mixing up RuPaul and the show’s musical director, Rickey Minor.
The Television Academy account tweeted out a picture of Emmy-winner Minor on the red carpet but the caption identified him as RuPaul. The tweet was deleted and one of RuPaul with the same caption uploaded.
However, some eagle-eyed Twitter users spotted the slip and made sure the Television Academy social media team knew about it.
The mistake is even more galling considering RuPaul played a major role in the awards show, donning the gold makeup to portray the living personification of the Emmy award.
While live-tweeting the #Emmys red carpet arrivals, the TV Academy confused RuPaul with another black man https://t.co/yXUsPFjlQH pic.twitter.com/cpGgviIooi
— BuzzFeed News (@BuzzFeedNews) September 18, 2017
THAT IS RICKEY MINOR jesus h christ
— Globus Hystericus (@Prkan_708) September 17, 2017
That is Rickey Minor who looks NOTHING like RuPaul. Like literally not remotely and Ru is about a foot taller than Rickey! https://t.co/LCMtaCrAS3
— Medium Yachty (@pennystackhouse) September 18, 2017
Wait! Ricky Minor is the CONDUCTOR this year and the @TelevisionAcad still thought he was RuPaul?!? #Emmys
— W.L. Lewis (@ArtMusicLife) September 18, 2017
So do you think ALL black people look the same or just some, that look nothing alike?
— J C (@yeahiheardthat) September 17, 2017