Selena Gomez and Karla Sofía Gascón made headlines at the 2025 Oscars for all the wrong reasons, as their brief and visibly tense exchange went viral following Karla’s social media controversy.
The two actresses, who starred together in the acclaimed musical crime drama Emilia Pérez, shared a moment in the audience that quickly set the internet alight.
A simple kiss on the cheek, exchanged as they greeted each other over their seats, sparked a frenzy of speculation, with fans dissecting every detail of their interaction.
Karla, who hails from Spain, has been a major talking point this awards season after becoming the first trans woman to be nominated in the Best Actress category for her role as a drug cartel leader who fakes his own death to transition into a woman.
While her nomination was a historic moment, the celebrations were soon overshadowed by resurfaced tweets containing inflammatory remarks about Islam, Black Lives Matter, and even Selena herself.
The backlash was swift, with Karla choosing to largely stay out of the awards circuit in the wake of the controversy.
Until Sunday night, it was unclear whether she would even attend the Oscars at all. She ultimately skipped the red carpet but appeared for the ceremony, which led to the now-infamous moment with Selena.
© Penske Media via Getty ImagesAs their awkward greeting was caught on camera, fans wasted no time turning the exchange into viral memes.
One user on X (formerly Twitter) joked that Karla was whispering, “The bomb will set off in 45 minutes. Leave the venue in a few,” a post that racked up more than 23,000 likes in under two hours.
Others, however, were outraged that Selena interacted with Karla at all, with one fan writing, “Selena should stop talking to her…after everything she did!”
© Matt Baron/BEI/ShutterstockThe tension wasn’t just between the Emilia Pérez co-stars—even Oscars host Conan O’Brien took aim at Karla’s controversy in his opening monologue.
After joking that Best Picture nominee Anora used the f-word 479 times, he quipped, “That’s three more than the record set by Karla Sofía Gascón’s publicist!”
As the camera cut to Karla, she gave a strained smile before Conan added: “Karla, if you are gonna tweet about the Oscars, my name is Jimmy Kimmel.” The moment was met with nervous laughter from the audience.
© NetflixThe controversy erupted last month when Muslim writer Sarah Hagi uncovered several problematic social media posts from Karla, some dating back to 2020.
In one tweet, Karla appeared to express xenophobic views about the Muslim population in Spain, writing: “I’m sorry. Is it just my impression, or are there more Muslims in Spain? Every time I pick up my daughter from school, there are more women with their hair covered and skirts down to their heels. Next year, instead of English, we’ll have to teach Arabic.”
Her tweets about the Black Lives Matter movement also resurfaced, including one where she dismissed the significance of George Floyd’s death.
“I really think that very few people ever cared about George Floyd, a drug addict swindler, but his death has served to once again demonstrate that there are people who still consider black people to be monkeys without rights and consider policemen to be assassins. They are both wrong,” she wrote.
Perhaps most shockingly, Karla had also made fun of Selena in a 2022 tweet that referenced her rumored feud with Justin Bieber’s wife, Hailey Bieber. “She’s a rich rat who plays the poor bastard whenever she can and will never stop bothering her ex-boyfriend and his wife,” Karla mocked at the time.
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