VMAs 2015: Was Nicki Minaj and Miley Cyrus' awkward acceptance put-down real or staged?

After all, nothing is more boring than an amicable awards ceremony

Chris Mandle
Monday 31 August 2015 13:28 BST
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Miley Cyrus
Miley Cyrus

It speaks volumes that the best bits of an award ceremony are never to do with the actual awards.

At the MTV VMAs this year, where everyone was supposed to be patting themselves on the back for making some good music videos, talk instead was about Kanye’s bid for presidential victory, Justin Bieber crying like a Justin Bieber fan at a Justin Bieber concert and Miley Cyrus wearing what appeared to be a particularly jazzy harness for an outfit.

But just as the pre-awards beef between Taylor Swift and Nicki Minaj died down – with a very sincere performance and everything – Minaj took a swipe at Miley while she was collecting her award for her video for "Anaconda".

Miley had discussed the Swift/Minaj argument in a recent New York Times interview, saying Minaj was “Not too kind […] not very polite” and implied that she had dealt with the whole thing quite poorly.

Minaj, after thanking everyone for her award, said: "This b***h that had a lot to say about me the other day in the press. Miley, what’s good?"

Cyrus was on stage about to perform a scripted bit between awards, and, caught off guard, tried to respond with a line about the industry manipulating their words, before saying "Congratuf***alations," and moving on.

Nicki can be seen mouthing on the stage, pointing at Cyrus, and social media erupted with memes, gifs and reactions to the beef.

People were trying to figure out whether it was real or not last night. MTV's Instagram post referencing the incident seconds after it happened seemed particularly suspicious.

A photo posted by MTV News (@mtvnews) on

But given how tepid the whole ceremony could have been without a bit of drama, is it possible the whole thing was a bit… you know, planned?

Miley’s response might have looked pretty genuine, but there fact is, nothing half as dull as an award ceremony where everyone seems to get along.

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