The last time there was a mixup like Sunday night's Oscar fiasco, there were few feature-length colour films, no TVs and certainly no social media networks for people to vent their outrage.

The disastrous "La La Land"-"Moonlight" mistake of 2017 is rivalled only by the Best Director debacle of 1934, at the sixth Academy Awards. However, that mistake was caused not by a misplaced envelope, but by a case of mistaken identity.

Three directors were up for the honour in 1934, and two of them were named Frank: Frank Capra, for "Lady for a Day," and Frank Lloyd, for "Cavalcade."

During the Best Director presentation, host Will Rogers got a little too casual with his announcement. Instead of reading the name of the film and the winning director, he simply said: "Come on up, Frank!"

Frank Capra assumed it was him, and so did most of those around him. But on the other side of the room, Frank Lloyd was also making his way to the stage.

According to Capra's autobiography, he reached the dance floor at the awards show and expected the spotlight to fall on him. But it didn't. Instead, it highlighted Lloyd, the real winner.

"I wish I could have crawled under the rug like a miserable worm," Capra wrote in his autobiography, "The Name Above the Title."

Capra called himself a "big stupido" for the incident, "running up to get an Oscar dying with excitement, only to crawl back dying with shame."

However, Capra would get his moment in the spotlight the next year, as winner of Best Director for "It Happened One Night." He won two more directing honours after that, for "Mr. Deeds Goes to Town" in 1937, and "You Can't Take It with You" in 1939.

Actress Rosalind Russell also experienced a similar situation in 1948, when she wrongly assumed she was about to win the Best Actress award for "Mourning Becomes Electra." Russell had been a favourite to win the award, and even went so far as to stand up before her name was announced.

But her name was never announced. Instead, Loretta Young won the prize for "The Farmer's Daughter," leaving Russell to cover her embarrassment with a standing ovation for her competitor.

Of course, none of them made it to the stage and started delivering speeches for an Oscar they didn't win, so "La La Land" still deserves the Oscar for Most Awkward Moment Ever.