LOS ANGELES | A man accused of stealing Frances McDormand’s best actress Oscar from an official after-party has been arrested, Los Angeles police said on Monday.
Terry Bryant, 47, was taken into custody on a grand theft charge and was being held on $20,000 bond, police spokeswoman Norma Eisenman said.
Bryant was arrested on Sunday night after McDormand’s award went missing briefly at the lavish Governor’s Ball party in Hollywood, where Academy Award winners have their statuettes engraved.
The Oscar was retrieved and later returned to McDormand.
“After a brief time apart, Frances and her Oscar were happily reunited. They celebrated the reunion with a double cheeseburger from In and Out,” McDormand’s representative, Simon Halls, said in a statement, referring to a local fast-food chain.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences did not return a request for comment on Monday.
Bryant posted a video of himself in a tuxedo at the event holding an Oscar statuette and telling other guests he was a winner.
“Look, I got this,” Bryant said in the video. “This is mine!”
It was not immediately clear in what capacity he was attending the event, but police said he had a ticket.
McDormand, 60, won her second acting Oscar for her role as an angry, grieving mother in “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri.”
It was not clear how Bryant took possession of the Oscar or how it was recovered. But Reuters photographer Mario Anzuoni saw an Academy official at the Governor’s Ball briefly handing the recovered statuette to best actor winner Gary Oldman to return to McDormand.
Oldman posed for photos with the two Oscars but returned it to officials because the actress had already left the ball.
