here's to the fools who dream.

Oscar winners Damien Chazelle and Barry Jenkins embrace the morning after a historic and emotional Oscar night. (Photo by Gavin Bond)

The separate awards paths for “La La Land” and “Moonlight” began nearly six months ago, when the two films world-premiered just two days apart. Chazelle’s movie opened the Venice Film Festival on Aug. 31, while Jenkins bowed his sophomore effort Sept. 2 in Telluride.

After Chazelle made the trip from Venice to Telluride to screen his film at the Colorado festival, the two directors met for the first time and saw each other’s movies. At a filmmakers’ event, Jenkins caught Chazelle by surprise by leading with a question about Chazelle’s film school debut, “Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench.”

“He immediately accessed my heart,” recalls Chazelle.

Jenkins saw “La La Land” at a screening later at Telluride and immediately felt a touch of homesickness when he saw his downtown Los Angeles apartment building featured in the film’s opening sequence.

“I hadn’t been to L.A. in, like, two months at that point. I had been traveling overseas,” he says. “It made me feel nostalgic for L.A., which I have never felt.”

Endless List of Favourite Films: La La Land (2016)

Emma Stone in Givenchy