Cooper recalled to Oprah Winfrey the moment he found out during a taping of her interview show, Oprah's SuperSoul Conversations.

"The first thing I felt was embarrassment, actually" he told the media mogul.

"I felt embarrassed that I didn't do my part.'" he continued.

"I went, 'Oh, gosh. I didn't do my job,'"

Winfrey also told the star that she was surprised to see him left out of the Oscar's category.

While Cooper wasn't nominated for his directorial debut, A Star Is Born did receive eight nods from the Academy, including best picture, best actor, actress and supporting actor.

"Even if I got the nomination, it should not give me any sense of whether I did my job or not," he told Winfrey.

"That's the trick, to make something that you believe in."

"The only thing I set out to do was tap into as an authentic place as possible, in myself and everybody I asked to make this movie" he continued.

In a roundtable interview with The Hollywood Reporter, alongside the likes of BlacKkKlansman's Spike Lee and Roma's Alfonso Cuaron, Cooper described directing as "joyful" and said it "felt like a seamless transition".

"I felt like I was exactly in the place I was suppose to be in that moment".