Oscars producer Molly McNearney has revealed Malala Yousafzai had no idea she’d be involved in a segment during this year’s live ceremony ahead of time.
Molly – who is married to Oscars 2023 host Jimmy Kimmel – praised the education activist for being such a “good sport” about the segment, in which the US talk show host came into the audience and approached the A-list guests with some rather irreverent questions.
During this section, he asked Malala: “As the youngest Nobel Prize winner in history, do you think Harry Styles spit on Chris Pine?”
And despite having no warning she’d be on camera, Malala still gave the best response, commenting simply: “I only talk about peace.”
“That’s why you’re Malala – that’s a great answer,” Jimmy then told her.
After the event, Malala shared a clip of the exchange on Twitter with the message “treat people with kindness” (Harry Styles’ personal mantra), and also retweeted a Jezebel article with the headline: “Let Malala gossip about pop culture”.
In an interview with Variety published on Monday, Molly revealed that she and Jimmy “ran into her” at Vanity Fair’s Oscars party, insisting: “She couldn’t have been nicer, more gracious.
“She was worried, ‘I hope my answer was okay.’ Well, we thought her answer was amazing.”
Somehow, things took an even more bizarre turn after Malala’s on-air exchange with Jimmy, when she ended up being accosted by an actor in a Cocaine Bear costume, who appeared to go off-script after taking part in a sketch with the film’s director Elizabeth Banks.