Younger me didn\'t feel Academy Awards would understand me, Eminem says

Eminem's "Lose yourself" performance was one of the biggest surprises of the 92nd Academy Award, and the rapper said he was happy to have made it to the stage 17 years after he won an Oscar for the "8 Mile" song.

The rapper, who was in talks to perform in 2003, gave the ceremony a miss and the co-writer on "Lose yourself", Luis Resto accepted the Oscar on his behalf.

In an interview with Variety, Eminem said at that time, he felt Academy Awards were not a right place for him to perform.

"I kinda figured maybe 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... So we didn't think it was a good idea. And also, back at that time, the younger me didn't really feel like a show like that would understand me.

"But then when I found out I won, “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," the rapper said.

At the time some reports claimed that Eminem didn't perform because the Oscars wanted him to do 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's only a couple. That's not true at all," he said.

For his Sunday night performance at the Oscars, Eminem received a standing ovation from the who's who of the entertainment industry including Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio, Gal Gadot, Grammy winner Billie Ellish and Anthony Ramos.