Lufthansa has recovered an Academy Award statuette that went missing after a TSA security agent at New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport barred Russian director Pavel Talankin from carrying it onto a flight to Frankfurt, Germany.
The airline confirmed on Friday that the Oscar had been located in Frankfurt and that it was arranging its return to Talankin as quickly as possible.
Talankin, who co-directed the Best Documentary Feature winner Mr. Nobody Against Putin at the 2026 Academy Awards, was flying home to Europe on 29 April when a TSA agent stopped him at the gate and ruled that the statuette could be used as a weapon. As Talankin did not have a checked bag, airport staff placed the Oscar in a cardboard box and sent it in the aircraft hold. It did not arrive in Frankfurt.
“We can confirm that the Oscar statue has now been located and is safely in our care in Frankfurt,” Lufthansa said in a statement. “We are in direct contact with the guest to arrange its personal return as quickly as possible. We sincerely regret the inconvenience caused and have apologized to the owner.” The airline added that an internal review of the circumstances was ongoing.
The incident prompted an immediate outcry after David Borenstein, Talankin’s co-director on the film, posted the story on Instagram and tagged Lufthansa directly. “At the airport, a TSA agent stopped him and said the Oscar could be used as a weapon. She wouldn’t let him carry it on board,” Borenstein wrote. “Pavel didn’t have a bag to check it in, so the TSA put the Oscar in a box and sent it to the bottom of the plane. It never arrived in Frankfurt.”
Borenstein also raised questions about how the situation was handled. “I’ve looked and I can’t find a single other case of someone being forced to check an Oscar. Would Pavel have been treated the same way if he were a famous actor? Or a fluent English speaker?” he wrote.
Multiple attempts were made at the checkpoint to find a compromise before the statuette was placed in the hold. A Lufthansa agent offered to walk Talankin to the gate and keep the Oscar in their possession for the duration of the flight, but TSA refused. A second proposal to store the statuette in the cockpit was also overruled by both TSA and a Lufthansa supervisor.
The incident was particularly striking given Talankin’s prior travel history with the award. He had carried the Oscar as a cabin bag without any difficulty on previous flights, including his return to Europe after the Academy Awards ceremony on 15 March and a subsequent trip back to the United States in April. “I flew with it in the cabin, and there never was any kind of problem,” Talankin said from Frankfurt.
Talankin accepted the Best Documentary award at the 97th Academy Awards in March 2026. Speaking on stage through a translator, he said: “In the name of our future, in the name of all of our children, stop all of these wars now.” The film, which Talankin co-directed with Borenstein, documents his efforts to oppose the Russian government from abroad and was among the most prominent documentaries of the awards season.
The TSA did not immediately respond to media queries following the incident. Lufthansa said it was working to return the statuette to Talankin in person in Frankfurt as soon as possible.
Photo: Instagram/pashatalankin
