Eminem opens up about his surprise performance of Lose Yourself at Oscars 2020

One of the major surprises at the Oscars 2020 was rapper Eminem's out-of-the-blue performance of  Lose yourself, a song that won him an Academy Award 17 years ago. 

Interestingly, Eminem did not attend the ceremony in 2003, and his associate Luis Resto accepted the award from legendary actress-singer Barbra Streisand.

In an interview with variety.com, Marshall Mathers aka Eminem, opened up about how his Sunday night performance came together. "I figured since I didn't get a chance to do it at the time, maybe it would be cool. Back then, I never even thought that I had a chance to win, and we had just performed Lose yourself on the Grammys with the Roots a couple of weeks before the Oscars, so we didn't think it was a good idea. And also, back at that time, the younger me didn't really feel a show like that would understand me," said the rapper.

"But then when I found out I won, I went, 'That's crazy!' That, to me, shows how authentic and real that award is — when you don't show up and you still win. That makes it very real to me," he added.

"I don't even think I understood back then that you could get an Oscar for a song, and I remember being kinda confused about why I was even up for one," said Eminem.

The rapper also dismissed allegations that he did not perform the song in 2003 because the Academy wanted him to sing a censored version of the song. "Oh no, that wasn't the case at all, because there's not even that many cuss words in it — there are only a couple. That's not true at all," he clarified.

However, Eminem did reveal that he enjoyed being at Oscars this year. "Absolutely. I got to hug Salma Hayek," he shared.