Welcome back to the Deep Dive. We take all this
dense stuff, you know, articles, history, even
legal docs, and pull out what you really need
to know. So you're instantly up to speed. Yeah,
exactly. And today we are going deep on the Academy
Awards, the Oscars. That's right. We're peeling
back the layers. Forget the red carpet for a
minute. Forget the gold plating. Okay. We're
digging into the history, which is honestly...
Kind of surprising, almost secretive in parts.
And the statue itself, that iconic Oscar, its
legal status is fascinating. There's that whole
$1 buyback thing we have to talk about. Right,
the famous $1 rule. Yeah, and just the whole
complex machine that decides who even gets considered,
who gets nominated, who wins. It's really a story
about how artistic recognition turned into this
massive high -stakes game in Hollywood. Marketing
rules everything. Okay, let's start right at
the beginning then. What are the Oscars? officially
we know the name academy awards of merit presented
by mpas right the academy of motion picture arts
and sciences for artistic and technical merit
everyone says they're the most prestigious but
why what gives them that final word well a lot
of it is just history they were first simple
as that really first yeah the oldest worldwide
entertainment awards show we're talking 1929
and here's the kicker all those other big american
awards you know the emmys for tv The Tonys for
Broadway, the Grammys for music, they were all
basically copied from the Oscars. Okay. Yeah.
The Academy Awards literally created the blueprint
for how you recognize art on an industrial global
scale. They set the standard. So they established
the prestige factor, but the actual start, it
sounds almost, well. Kind of small and quiet
compared to now. Oh, absolutely. Hilariously
low -key, you could say. The very first ceremony.
It was just a private dinner. Oh, yeah. Hollywood
Roosevelt Hotel, May 16th, 1929. And the audience?
Tiny. Maybe 270 people. Wow. If you wanted to
bring a guest, a ticket was $5. Which, okay,
inflation means that's about $92 today, but still.
Still pretty cheap for the Oscars. Right. And
the ceremony itself. The whole thing. 15 minutes.
15 minutes. That's barely time for appetizers.
Exactly. Forget long speeches. So thinking about
the suspense now, the envelopes, it's surprising
that back then there wasn't any suspense at all.
People knew who won. Correct. That was maybe
their first big misstep. For that 1929 dinner,
they told the newspapers who won three months
before the event. Three months. Why would they
do that? Well, they quickly realized it completely
killed any excitement, any buzz. So they changed
tactics. For the next, oh, roughly 10 years.
What did they try then? They'd give the results
to the papers, but with a strict rule, an embargo.
Ah, like don't print this until... Exactly. Don't
publish until 11 .00 p .m. on the night of the
actual awards ceremony. Okay, a gentleman's agreement.
Sounds fragile, though, especially with competing
newspapers. Did it hold? Not always. And it failed
spectacularly in 1940. The Los Angeles Times,
they just went ahead and printed the winnals
early, before the ceremony even started. Ouch.
So much for the embargo. Yeah, it wasn't just
bad journalism. It broke the whole system, showed
you couldn't trust that approach if you wanted
the awards to be this big, popular event. So
what happened right after that leak? What was
the fix? The fix was immediate and permanent.
Starting the very next year, 1941, they brought
in the sealed envelopes. The system we know today.
The exact system. It was a fast change born out
of necessity, really, to protect that moment
of surprise. That envelope itself is now, you
know, an icon of secrecy. Let's touch on some
early quirks, too, because the rules weren't
totally set yet. Like Emil Jannings, the first
Best Actor winner. He got his award super early.
Yeah, that's right. He actually got his statuette
three months before the ceremony. Why? Because
he was heading back to Europe and wouldn't be
there for the dinner, so they just gave it to
him early. Shows how informal things were. And
that informality extended to what people won
for, not always just one film. Exactly. In the
first ceremony, winners were often recognized
for their whole body of work during that eligibility
period, not just a single movie. Can you give
an example? Sure. Janet Gaynor. First. Best Actress
winner. She won for her performances in three
different films that year. Three films for one
award. Uh -huh. Seventh Heaven, Sunrise, and
Street Angel. Totally unthinkable today. They
stopped doing that pretty quick. After the third
Academy Awards, they locked it down to recognizing
just one specific achievement per award. And
as movies changed, the awards had to change too,
adding new categories. Constantly adapting, or
trying to. Look at international films. The Best
International Feature Film Award, it used to
be called Best Foreign Language Film. That started
out as just a special kind of honorary award,
non -competitive. That was at the 20th ceremony.
So it wasn't a real category yet? Not really.
It took almost another decade until the 29th
ceremony before it became a proper competitive
award like the others, showing that global cinema
was becoming too important to ignore. And animation
took even longer to get its own feature category.
Much longer. Best animated feature film didn't
show up until the 74th ceremony. That was 2002.
And the first winner was? Shrek, which was, you
know, a monster hit. Yeah. So these new categories,
they often feel like the Academy playing catch
up, right? Trying to formally acknowledge these
huge parts of the movie world that they'd previously
sort of sidelined. Okay. Let's shift gears to
the actual award. Section two, the statuette.
Probably the most famous trophy on earth, but
it has that really dry official name. It does.
Officially. It's the Academy Award of Merit.
Nobody calls it that. Nobody. Everyone knows
it as Oscar. The design is pure art deco. It's
a knight holding a crusader sword. Right. Standing
on a reel of film. And it's got some heft. Thirteen
and a half inches tall, weighs eight and a half
pounds. Not something you just toss in your bag.
Definitely not. And the design itself, the knight
on the film reel, that's packed with meaning,
isn't it? Oh, yeah. Very specific symbolism.
The film reel he's standing on has five spokes.
Five spokes? Why five? They represent the original
five branches of the Academy when it was founded.
You had actors, writers, directors, producers,
and technicians. Ah, the core groups. Exactly.
It was designed by Cedric Gibbons, the supervising
art director at MGM, and then sculpted by an
artist named George Stanley. The whole idea was
to create something timeless, rooted right in
the structure of the movie industry itself. What
fascinates me most, though, is what it's made
of. Or rather, what it has been made of. It wasn't
always gold or even metal. Right. The materials
have a really interesting history. It started
as gold -plated solid bronze. Pretty standard.
Okay. Then for a long time, they switched to
something called Britannia metal. It's like pewter,
basically. That got plated in layers, copper
first, then nickel -silver, and finally the 24
-carat gold on top. Layered plating. But the
really wild part was during the war. Yeah, World
War II, there was a major metal shortage, obviously,
because of the war effort. So for three years,
the Oscars they handed out were made of painted
plaster. Painted plaster. Imagine winning the
highest honor in film and getting plaster. Must
have felt a bit, I don't know, anticlimactic.
I mean, probably, even considering the circumstances.
But the Academy knew the symbol mattered. So
after the war, when metal was available again.
They fixed it. They did. They invited everyone
who'd gotten a plaster Oscar to come trade it
in for a proper gold -plated metal one. Showed
they were committed to the, you know, the physical
prestige of the thing. So what about now? What
are they made of today? They actually went back
to bronze in 2016. A company called Polish Talix
makes the bronze core. Yeah. And then another
company, Eppner Technology, does the 24 -karat
gold electroplating. It's a serious process.
It takes about three months just to produce a
batch of 50 statuettes. Wow. Okay, now the name.
Oscar. How did that stick? There are so many
different stories. It's a total mystery, really,
which is probably why the Academy just went ahead
and trademarked the name Oscar to control it.
Smart move. Yeah. But what are the main theories?
Okay, theory one. Margaret Herrick. She was the
academy librarian, later executive director,
claimed back in 1931 that the statue reminded
her of her Uncle Oscar. Uncle Oscar. Theory two.
Bette Davis, the actress, she wrote in her autobiography
that she named it in 1936 after her first husband,
Harmon Oscar Nelson, because, well, she said
it reminded her of his backside. Seriously? That's
what she claimed. But she later walked that back,
realizing the name was probably already floating
around by then. Right. Theory three. Sidney Skolsky.
He was a Hollywood columnist. He claimed he claimed
it in 1934 because he was on deadline and needed
a catchy name. And it referenced some old vaudeville
joke. The Academy actually credits Skolsky with
the first confirmed newspaper use of Oscar that
year. OK, so maybe Skolsky. There's one more.
One more. Eleanor Lilleberg. She was an academy
secretary. A former exec director said she named
it. After a Norwegian army veteran she knew,
also named Oscar, who apparently stood straight
and tall like the statue. So basically, nobody
knows for sure. Pretty much. Could be any of
them or none of them. But the name stuck, and
now it's trademarked. Which leads us directly
to the most legally fascinating part. Yeah. The
$1 buyback rule. This is the genius move to protect
the award's value. Since 1950, every single Oscar
comes with legal strings attached. What kind
of strings? A contract, basically. If the person
who wins it, or their family later on, ever wants
to sell the statuette, they must offer it back
to the Academy first. For the grand total of
$1. $1. $1. And if the winner refuses to sign
that agreement when they receive the award, the
Academy just keeps the statuette. They don't
get to take it home. That's incredible. It's
not about the money. Clearly, it's about control.
Absolutely. It stops the Oscars from becoming
just another collectible on the open market.
If people started selling them for hundreds of
thousands or millions. It keepens the award itself.
Exactly. It turns artistic merit into a commodity.
The Academy has to keep that symbolic value pure
and controlling the physical object is how they
do it. It protects their most valuable trademark.
But the Oscars awarded before 1950, they don't
have that rule attached. Correct. Those are fair
game. And the few times they have come up for
sale, it shows us what the market would pay.
Like the Harold Russell case. Yeah, Harold Russell.
He wasn't a professional actor, won Best Supporting
Actor in 1946. In 1992, he needed money for his
wife's medical bills, so he sold his Oscar. How
much did it go for? $60 ,500, which is over $135
,000 in today's money. He defended it, too, said
his wife's health mattered more than sentiment.
Understandable. But the biggest sale was when
the Academy really didn't want to happen. Oh,
yeah. Orson Welles' Oscar. For writing Citizen
Kane in 1941, his family went to court. Aye.
They argued successfully that Welles never signed
any kind of buyback agreement because it didn't
exist back then. So the court let them sell it.
And sold for? Over $861 ,000 in 2011. Wow. Yeah.
So those pre 1950 sales really show you the kind
of money the Academy is trying to keep out of
the equation with that one dollar rule. OK, let's
move into the guts of it now. Yeah. Section three.
How does this all work? The nominations, the
eligibility rules, the voting. This is where
the Academy really wields its power, right? Yeah.
Defining who gets to even play. Absolutely. It
all starts with the voters, AMPAS, the Academy.
Right now, there are just over 9 ,900 voting
members. 9 ,905, I think, as of 2024. And getting
in isn't easy. No, it's invitation only. The
Board of Governors has to invite you. Usually
that happens if you get nominated for an Oscar
yourself or if you've made some other really
big contribution to film. It's meant to be exclusive.
But that exclusivity has historically led to
criticism about who exactly is in the academy.
Yeah. The demographics. Definitely. There was
a major study back in 2000 that really laid it
bare. It found that among active voters then,
94 % were white. 94 %? Yeah. 77 % were male.
And more than half, 54%, were over the age of
60. So overwhelmingly older, white, and male.
Historically, yes. And that context is crucial
when you think about what kinds of films tend
to get nominated and which ones get overlooked.
It's been a huge point of contention. Okay, so
that's the voters. What about the films? How
does a movie even become eligible for an Oscar?
The rules seem weirdly specific. They are incredibly
specific and very, very focused on Los Angeles.
Right. It has to play in L .A. Yes. To qualify
for, say, the 2024 Oscars, a feature film had
to open commercially in Los Angeles County sometime
in the calendar year 2023, January 1st to December
31st. And just opening isn't enough. Nope. It
has to play for at least seven consecutive days.
And even that has details. Like what? On each
of those seven days, it needs to screen at least
three times. And one of those screenings every
day must start sometime between 6 p .m. and 10
p .m. primetime. Wow. That feels like a very
deliberate way to ensure it's a real theatrical
run, not just a token screening. But does it
create odd situations? It creates the famous
rollover scenario. A movie might come out, say,
at a festival or even nationally in one year.
But if it doesn't complete that specific seven
day primetime L .A. run until the next calendar
year, it becomes eligible for the following year's
Oscars. You give an example of that. The classic
example is The Hurt Locker. It won Best Picture
at the 2010 ceremony for films from 2009. But
it had actually premiered at festivals way back
in 2008. It just didn't do its official L .A.
qualifying run until 2009. So it rolled over
into that eligibility year. What about technical
stuff? Length? Format? Standard stuff, mostly.
It has to be feature length. The definition is
40 minutes minimum, unless it's a short film
category, obviously. Right. Format wise, they
accept traditional 35 millimeter or 70 millimeter
film prints or now digital cinema projections.
But they have to meet a minimum resolution standard
2K, basically 2048 by 1080 pixels. It's a technical
bar. OK, so a film meets all that. It's eligible.
Now, how does the voting work? Getting nominated
first. This is where the branch system comes
in. For most categories like directing, acting,
writing, cinematography, the nominations are
decided within that specific branch. Meaning?
Meaning only directors vote for the Best Director
nominees. Only actors vote for the acting nominees,
writers for writing, and so on. Pure recognition.
But not for Best Picture? Correct. Best Picture
is the exception. For that one, all eligible
Academy members, regardless of their branch,
can vote to select the nominees. Okay, they have
the list of nominees. How do they pick the winner?
Is it just most votes wins? For most categories,
yes. Simple plurality. Whoever gets the most
votes takes home the statue. Straightforward.
But not for Best Picture. That's different, right?
Since 2009. Exactly. Best Picture uses a system
called Instant Runoff Voting, or IRV, sometimes
called Preferential Voting or Ranked Choice Voting.
Okay, break that down for us. How does IRV work?
In this context. Instead of just picking your
single favorite film for best picture, voters
rank the nominees in order of preference. First
choice, second choice, third choice, and so on
down the list. Okay. Ranking them. Then what?
Then they count the first place votes. If one
film gets more than 50 % right off the bat, it
wins. Simple majority. But that probably doesn't
happen often with 10 nominees. Rarely. So if
no film hits 50%, the film with the fewest number
one votes is eliminated. Gone. Gone. But the
ballots that listed that film as number one are
just thrown out. They look at the second choice
on those ballots and they transfer those votes
to whoever was ranked second. They keep doing
this, eliminating the last place film and redistributing
its votes based on the next preference until
one film finally crosses that 50 percent threshold.
So it's designed to find the film with the broadest
support, not necessarily the one with the most
passionate niche following. Precisely. It favors
consensus. The idea is to prevent a film that
maybe 30 % love but 70 % dislike from winning.
You need to pick up those second and third place
votes. Makes sense for the biggest award. But
I saw something about best visual effects using
yet another system. re -weighted range voting.
Yeah, that's super technical. It's been used
since 2013 just for VFX. Essentially, the VFX
branch members don't just rank. They score the
nominated films based on different criteria,
and then those scores get mathematically adjusted
or weighted based on factors the branch decides
are important. It's really about finding the
strongest technical achievement according to
the experts in that specific field. Okay, shifting
gears slightly. There's a big new rule coming
in 2025 about voters actually watching the films.
Yes, this is a major change aimed at, well, ensuring
people vote based on the work. Starting with
the 2025 ceremony, members have to prove they've
watched all the nominated films in a category
if they want to vote in the final round for that
category. How do they prove it? Through the Academy
Screening Room. That's their secure online streaming
platform where voters watch the contenders. The
system tracks viewership. So no more voting based
on buzz or because your friend worked on it?
That's the goal. To combat the old criticism
that people voted without seeing everything,
it forces engagement. But that Academy screening
room. Right. Putting your film on there costs
money, right? Right. especially for smaller movies.
It absolutely does. This is a huge point of discussion.
The platform itself came about in 2019, largely
replacing physical DVD screeners. It's secure,
watermarked, all that. But the cost. For a North
American distributor to get their film onto that
platform for voter consideration, it's $12 ,500,
plus another fee for the watermarking. $12 ,500
just to be seen by the voters. Yep. So you see
the tension, right? The Academy is trying to
diversify its members, maybe open doors to different
kinds of films. But at the same time, they implement
the system that creates a pretty significant
five figure barrier to entry, especially for
independent or international films without big
studio backing. Yeah, that definitely complicates
the push for accessibility. It's that constant
pull between artistic ideals and the realities
of the business. And speaking of business, once
your film is on the platform, the Academy gets
really strict about how you promote it. The anti
-campaigning rules. How strict are we talking?
We know studios pour millions into for your consideration.
Yeah, the spending is immense. Easily $25 million
for a major campaign ads, screenings, hiring
top publicists. But the Academy has rules and
an awards czar. to try and police direct lobbying.
What kind of lobbying is forbidden? Things like
filmmakers directly emailing voters asking for
votes or hosting lavish parties that seem designed
purely to sway opinion. They try to limit anything
that feels like undue influence. Do they enforce
it? They do, sometimes publicly. The most famous
case recently involved a producer on the Hurt
Locker. He got disqualified from the best picture
category, just him, not the film, because he
sent emails to colleagues basically urging them
to vote for his film instead of the main rival,
Avatar. Wow. Yeah. The Academy has to crack down
on things like that, at least visibly, to maintain
the idea that it's about the art, not just who
runs the best campaign. Okay, section four. Let's
talk about the show itself, the ceremony. It's
this massive, hours -long, global TV event now.
How did it get that way? The venues, the timing?
Well, the venues moved around a lot in the early
days. We mentioned the Hollywood Roosevelt for
the first one. Then they bounced between the
Ambassador Hotel and the Biltmore for a while.
Then a longer stint at the Pantages Theater in
Hollywood in the 50s. But since 2002, it's found
a pretty permanent home at the Dolby Theater
right in the heart of Hollywood. That feels like
the modern Oscar home now. But the timing has
shifted strategically, too, right? Why did it
move from late spring to late February? That
move around 2004 had two big reasons. First,
it was a direct attempt to shorten Oscar season.
Cut down on the campaigning. Exactly. Make the
window for all that intense lobbying and advertising
shorter, maybe lessen its impact. The second
reason, pure business. Avoiding a clash with
March madness, the NCAA college basketball tournament
is a ratings giant, and it starts mid -March.
The Oscars didn't want to compete directly with
that. Smart. And what about moving from Monday
nights to Sunday nights? That seems like a smaller
change, but I heard it was a big deal for L .A.
Huge deal. That happened back for the 1999 ceremony.
The logic was simple. More people watch TV on
Sunday night than Monday. OK, ratings. Plus,
holding it on a Monday night in L .A., total
traffic nightmare during rush hour. For attendees,
for the city, moving to Sunday eased that considerably.
It's a year for people back east, too, I guess.
Yep. East Coast viewers are a massive chunk of
the audience. Ending the show earlier on a Sunday
means they don't have to stay up quite so late
on a work night. It's amazing how stable the
ceremony date has been, though. Only postponed
twice in all those years. Just twice due to major
events. In 1968, they delayed it by two days
after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated.
Purely out of respect. And then again in 1981,
just by 24 hours after the assassination attempt
on President Reagan. Otherwise, the show has
always gone on. The producer's biggest enemy,
though, seems to be the clock, keeping the show
from running too long. Oh, constantly. The average
is around three and a half hours, but they dread
those marathons. The longest ever was 2002, four
hours and 23 minutes. Oof. So they started cracking
down. Primarily on acceptance speeches. That's
where the time really ballooned. In 2010, they
brought in the hard 45 -second limit. The dreaded
playoff music. Exactly. One organizer literally
called the long rambling speeches the single
most hated thing on the show. So 45 seconds it
is. They've tried other things too, right? Like
that text crawl. Yeah, the on -screen ticker
for thank yous. That was tried in 2016. And remember
2018, when Jimmy Kimmel offered a brand new jet
ski to whoever gave the shortest speech. I do
remember that. Did anyone win it fairly? Mark
Bridges, the costume designer for Phantom Thread,
clocked in super short and won the jet ski. It
was a fun gimmick to make a point. What about
the In Memoriam segment? That's always emotional,
but it had some issues too. It did. The segment
itself started in 1993. The main criticisms were
always about who got left out inevitable snubs,
really. But the other issue was the audience
clapping. It turned into this awkward... Almost
like a popularity contest based on who got the
loudest applause, which felt wrong for a tribute.
So how did they fix that? They started actively
discouraging the audience from clapping during
the segment. Yeah. Trying to keep it more solemn
and uniformly respectful. Let's talk TV ratings,
because they seem to swing wildly depending on
the year. They absolutely do. And it boils down
to one simple thing. Blockbuster nominees. Meaning?
When the films nominated for Best Picture are
huge box office hits that everyone has seen,
the ratings go through the roof. The all -time
record, 1998, the year of Titanic. How many viewers?
57 .25 million people watched that ceremony.
Because everyone had seen Titanic and cared about
the outcome. But when the nominees are smaller,
maybe more critically acclaimed indie films.
The ratings plummet. If the Best Picture contenders
didn't make a big splash at the box office, fewer
casual viewers tune in. The lowest numbers recorded
since the 70s were in 2021 only 10 .4 million
viewers. Wow, that's a huge drop. It's the core
dilemma for the Academy. Do you reward the arthouse
favorites and lose the mass audience? Or try
to find films that bridge that gap? It drives
so many decisions. And finally, surrounding the
ceremony itself, there's this whole ecosystem
of parties and the gift bags. Legendary swag
bags. Oh, yeah. The parties are exclusive. The
official Governor's Ball right after the show.
Elton John's Big A's Foundation fundraiser. The
Vanity Fair party. Right. But the gift bags given
to presenters, performers, and sometimes nominees,
they're insane. Not from the Academy itself,
mind you, but from outside companies. Insane
how we're not talking keychains and mugs. Not
even close. We're talking tens of thousands of
dollars in value. Yeah. One year, 2014, they
were reportedly worth up to $80 ,000. $80 ,000.
What's in them? All sorts of luxury stuff. Exotic
vacation packages. Think Hawaii, Japan, luxury
resorts, private gourmet dinners, high -end cosmetic
procedures like vouchers for $25 ,000 worth of
fillers or laser peels. Seriously, $25 ,000 in
cosmetic work. Yep. Plus expensive foods, gadgets.
Even some years included fairly high -end adult
products. Very controversial. I bet. And if something's
worth $80 ,000, Uncle Sam wants a piece. You
better believe it. The IRS actually had to issue
a specific statement about these gift bags. What
did they say? Basically reminded everyone that
these aren't gifts in the tax sense. If you get
an $80 ,000 bag of goodies, that's $80 ,000 of
taxable income you need to report. Ouch. Takes
some of the shine off the free stuff. Absolutely.
It really highlights how intertwined the whole
event is with big money in commerce, even down
to the freebies. Okay, section five. Let's look
at the awards themselves, the categories, how
they've changed, appeared, disappeared. Yeah,
the categories really reflect the history of
filmmaking technology and trends. Like we mentioned,
early on things were split. Best Director had
separate awards for drama and comedy in the very
first year. And for a long time, until the 1960s,
major crafts like cinematography, costume design,
art direction, they all had separate awards for
black and white films and for color films. Because
color was still a distinct technology. Exactly.
Once color became standard, those split categories
didn't make sense anymore and they merged them.
Which big categories that feel essential now
actually took a while to show up? Well, the Supporting
Actor and Actress Awards are a huge part of this.
show now right they often give us some of the
most memorable wins definitely but they weren't
introduced until 1936 and best original screenplay
didn't become a category until 1940 so the basic
structure we know took over a decade to really
solidify and just as categories were added others
vanished awards that just don't exist anymore
yeah it's like a little time capsule The first
ceremony had an award for best engineering effects.
Gone. Best title writing that was literally for
the text cards in silent movies. Obsolete overnight
with sound. Pretty much. Best original story
was a separate writing award they got rid of
in 1956. And maybe surprisingly late, best sound
editing was folded into a single best sound category
only recently in 2019. But the pressure is always
on the Academy to add new categories, right?
To recognize skills that maybe feel overlooked.
big ones are finally coming. This is massive
news for people in these fields. First up, best
casting. It's officially starting with the 98th
ceremony in 2026. Casting directors finally get
their due. They tried before, didn't they? Oh,
yeah. A proposal for a casting award was shot
down back in 1999. So this has been a long, long
fight. It's recognizing just how crucial casting
is to the whole creative process. And the other
big one, finally, stunts. Yes. Best stunt design.
Set to debut at the 100th Academy Awards in 2028.
This is maybe the most overdue recognition of
all. How long has that been pushed for? Decades.
The Academy formally rejected proposals for a
Best Stunt Coordination Award every year from
1991 through 2012. Wow. That's persistent rejection.
It really is. So for them to finally add stunt
design, it's a huge victory for that community
and acknowledges how essential and how carefully
designed stunt work is in modern movies, especially
the big blockbusters that, ironically, often
get Best Picture nominations. Yeah, the irony
is definitely there. It feels like the Academy
slowly acknowledging the reality of how films
are made today. It's always that tension. Artistic
tradition versus industry evolution. We should
also mention that Best Popular Film idea that
fizzled out fast. Oh, right. That was announced
in 2018. The idea was to create a specific award
for blockbuster hits, probably to boost ratings
after some popular movies got snubbed for Best
Picture. How could they go over well? Terrible
reception. Critics, filmmakers, pretty much everyone
hated it. They felt it would create Like a ghetto
category, implying popular films couldn't compete
for the main prize. The backlash was so strong,
the Academy quickly postponed it and it just
vanished. Never happened. Smart retreat. What
about the non -competitive awards, the honorary
ones? Right. Those are decided differently, not
by the entire membership voting, but by special
committees. Like the honorary Oscar. Exactly.
The Academy Honorary Award is given pretty much
every year for lifetime achievement or outstanding
contributions. Then there's the Gene Herschel
Humanitarian Award. One actually comes in the
form of an Oscar statuette recognizing philanthropic
work. Okay. And the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial
Award. That one's different. It's a bust of Thalberg,
not an Oscar statue. And it honors producers
with a consistently high quality of work over
their careers. These let the Academy recognize
important figures outside the regular annual
competition. Our Section 6. This is where it
gets juicy. The controversies, the criticisms,
the friction points. When you have this much
prestige and money involved, things get messy.
Let's start with the commercialism angle. The
intense Oscar season lobbying. Yeah, this is
maybe the oldest and loudest criticism. We talked
about the spending $25 million or more per film
isn't uncommon for a big campaign. And director
William Friedkin famously called the whole thing
the greatest promotion scheme that any industry
ever devised for itself. The accusation is simple.
The awards aren't always about quality. They're
about who runs the slickest, most expensive campaign,
who hires the best publicists. And that leads
to studios making specific types of movies just
to win the Oscar bait phenomenon. Exactly. Oscar
bait. It's almost a genre in itself. These are
films that seem tailor -made to appeal to what's
perceived as the traditional taste of Academy
voters. What does that look like? Often it's
historical dramas, biopics about famous figures,
sometimes period romances. Films with serious
themes, maybe a disability or overcoming adversity.
And crucially, they're often released late in
the year, December, to be fresh in voters' minds
during nomination season. And the criticism is
that this crowds out other types of films. That's
the argument. That the focus on Oscar bait means
innovative genre films, comedies, sci -fi, horror.
They get ignored, even if they're critically
acclaimed or hugely popular. Which actually led
to a major rule change, didn't it? The 2009 snubs.
Yes, that was a watershed moment. The 81st Academy
Awards. Highly popular, universally acclaimed
films like The Dark Knight and WALL -E failed
to get Best Picture nominations. Same people
were mad. Furious. The backlash from the public
and even within the industry was enormous. People
felt the Academy was completely out of touch.
So what did the Academy do? They reacted directly.
The very next year, they expanded the Best Picture
category from five nominees to ten. To make more
room. Exactly. The hope... was that with 10 slots,
there'd be room for both the traditional prestige
pictures and some of the more popular acclaimed
blockbusters or genre films that had been getting
shut out. This intense competition also feels
some pretty nasty tactics, right? The whisper
campaigns? Oh, definitely. Negative campaigning
is a dark art in Hollywood. It involves spreading
rumors, highlighting potential controversies,
or just creating negative buzz about a rival
film, often anonymously or through surrogates.
And Harry Weinstein was famous for this. Notoriously
so. Miramax under Weinstein was known for aggressive
tactics. The most cited example is the 1999 race
where his film, Shakespeare in Love, beats Saving
Private Ryan for Best Picture. Many believe that
Wynne was helped by a campaign that subtly questioned
Ryan's historical accuracy or painted it negatively.
Wow. Have there been other examples? Yeah. Films
like Zero Dark 30 faced campaigns questioning
its portrayal of torture. Lincoln faced minor
historical quibbles amplified during voting.
It's about planting seeds of doubt. OK, let's
talk diversity. We mentioned the demographic
stats earlier. This blew up with hashtag OscarSoWhite.
It really did. The numbers were stark. Historically,
something like only 6 .4 % of all acting nominees
had been people of color. Even looking just since
1991, it was only up to about 11 .2%. And then
came a year with zero non -white acting nominees.
Two years in a row, actually, for the 87th and
88th ceremonies. That second year sparked the
hashtag OscarSoWhite hashtag and boycott movement.
It put immense pressure on the Academy. What
was their response? They had to respond. They
promised historic changes, pledging to double
the number of women and diverse members by 2020.
They've been actively recruiting a much broader
range of members since then. And we're seeing
results. We are starting to see them. More diverse
nominees across categories and milestones like
Michelle Yeoh becoming the first Asian woman
to win Best Actress in 2023 for Everything Everywhere
All at Once. But it's an ongoing process and
debate. And even the definitions of diversity
in their new standards have caused some controversy.
That's true. The Academy created these Representation
and Inclusion Standards Initiative, or RAISE,
outlining diversity requirements for best picture
eligibility, covering on -screen representation,
crew diversity, internships, etc. But those standards
have been criticized by some groups for specifically
not including Jewish people as a recognized underrepresented
group, despite historical anti -Semitism and
exclusion in Hollywood. So the debate continues.
about who counts as diverse for these purposes.
Let's shift to category fraud. This feels like
gaming the system. It's a very common tactic
and highly controversial. It happens when a studio
submits an actor for a supporting award when
their role is arguably large enough or central
enough to be considered a lead. Why do they do
that? Strategy. If you have two strong leads
in a film, submitting one as supporting means
they don't compete against each other. It increases
the odds of the film winning multiple acting
awards. Can you give some examples people point
to? Oh, there are many debated examples. Rooney
Mara in Carol had huge screen time but was run
as supporting. Same for Brad Pitt in Once Upon
a Time in Hollywood. Viola Davis in Fences won
supporting but many felt it was a lead role.
It often comes down to studio campaign decisions.
And then there's the idea that sometimes people
win not for that specific performance, but for
their whole career. The legacy Oscar, the makeup
Oscar. Yeah, that's a recurring criticism. Like
the Academy is saying, oops, we should have given
you one years ago. Kind of. The feeling is that
sometimes an actor, director, or composer wins
for a perfectly fine performance, but maybe not
the best that year because the voters feel they're
overdue or were unfairly snubbed in the past.
Think Al Pacino finally winning for Scent of
a Woman or Martin Scorsese for The Departed.
Great artists, but were those their absolute
peak achievements? Debatable. It definitely raises
questions about merit in a specific year. Now,
the streaming debate. Netflix, Amazon. That really
shook things up. It caused a genuine panic among
some Hollywood traditionalists, especially after
Roma, a Netflix film, got 10 nominations in 2019,
including Best Picture and Best Director. Who
was leading the pushback? Steven Spielberg was
very vocal. He and others argued that films primarily
released on streaming platforms weren't real
movies in the same way as theatrically released
ones and shouldn't be eligible for the top awards,
especially Best Picture. They worried streaming
giants would just buy up all the Oscars. But
the government got involved. Yes. The U .S. Department
of Justice actually sent a letter to the Academy.
Really? They warned the Academy that changing
the rules specifically to exclude streaming services
could potentially violate antitrust laws. Essentially,
they couldn't arbitrarily block competitors just
because they used a different distribution model.
So what was the outcome? The Academy backed down
from any major exclusion. They kept the existing
rule. Streaming films are eligible if they meet
the minimum theatrical release requirements,
including that L .A. County run we talked about.
It was a compromise. It's rare, but powerful
when it happens. The first was way back in 1935.
Dudley Nichols, a screenwriter, won for The Informer
but refused it initially. Why? It was a protest.
There was a conflict going on between the Academy
and the Writers Guild at the time. He did eventually
accept it a few years later, though. Who's the
most famous refuser? George C. Scott? Probably
him or Brando. Scott won Best Actor for Patton
in 1970. He was very outspoken against the awards,
famously calling the ceremony a two -hour meat
parade. He made it clear beforehand he wouldn't
accept, and he didn't. Brando won Best Actor
in 1972 for The Godfather. He refused the award
as a protest against the negative stereotyping
and mistreatment of Native Americans by the film
industry. And he sent someone in his place. Yes,
he sent Sasheen Littlefeather, an Apache actress
and activist, onto the stage. She declined the
statuette and read a statement from Brando explaining
his reasons. It was a hugely controversial and
highly televised moment. Finally, the recent
really public incidence, the slap. Yeah, you
can't talk about recent Oscar controversy without
mentioning the 2022 ceremony. Will Smith walking
on stage and slapping Chris Rock after Rock made
a joke about Jada Pinkett Smith's appearance.
And Smith won Best Actor later that night. He
did, which made the whole thing even more surreal.
The aftermath was huge, obviously. The Academy
investigated and ultimately banned Smith from
attending the Oscars or any Academy events for
10 years. A less violent but still significant
controversy is how animation gets treated. Yes.
This is a sore spot for many in the animation
industry who feel their craft isn't taken seriously
enough. What's the issue? It's often the language
used by presenters when giving out the best animated
feature award. Comments during the 2022 and 2024
ceremonies kind of dismissing animation as just
something for kids or formative experiences.
When many nominees are quite adults. Exactly.
Films like Flea about an Afghan refugee or The
Windshield Wiper, a short exploring love. These
are complex, mature works. Animators, many involved
in the hashtag New Deal for Animation movement
fighting for better working conditions, argue
this language infantilizes their art form and
ignores its sophistication. Okay, we're nearing
the end. Let's wrap up with some impressive records
and milestones. Section 7. The Superlatives.
Who holds the biggest records? You have to start
with Walt Disney. He's in a league of his own.
Most awards ever. By far. 26 total Academy Awards.
22 of those were competitive wins, plus four
honorary awards. He was nominated 59 times. 59.
Incredible. Did he win multiple in one night?
Yes. He also holds a record for the most Oscars
won in a single year. He won four at the 1954
ceremony. His records seem pretty unbreakable.
What about nominations in just one category?
Is there a specialist? That would be composer
John Williams. The man behind Star Wars, Jaws,
Indiana Jones. Right. He has been nominated an
incredible 48 times just for best original score.
He's won five times in that category. Most nominations
without ever winning a competitive award. That
must sting. It's currently a tie, sadly. Sound
mixer Greg P. Russell and songwriter Diane Warren
both have 16 nominations without a competitive
win. 16 tries. Wow. Didn't Russell have a nomination
taken away? He did. His 17th nomination was actually
revoked because he violated those campaigning
rules about contacting voters improperly. So
he stuck at 16 losses. Diane Warren, though,
finally received an honorary Oscar in 2023, recognizing
her amazing career. Okay, looking at the films,
which movies have won the most Oscars? There's
a three -way tie, right? Yes, 11 wins is the
magic number. Tied at the top are Ben -Hur from
1959. Classic epic. Titanic from 1997. Global
phenomena. And The Lord of the Rings, Return
of the King from 2003. And Return of the King
did something unique. It did. It won every single
category it was nominated in. 11 nominations,
11 wins. A clean sweep, which is almost unheard
of at that scale. Which films hold the record
for most nominations? Also a tie. 14 nominations
is the record there, held by All About Eve from
1950, Titanic again in 1997, and La La Land in
2016. But most nominations without winning anything.
That's got to be painful. 11 nominations, zero
wins. That unfortunate record is shared by two
films, the ballet drama The Turning Point from
1977 and Steven Spielberg's The Color Purple
from 1985. Ouch. 11 chances, nothing. What about
franchises? Which series has the most total wins?
That would be the Lord of the Rings trilogy overall.
Across the three films, they racked up a total
of 17 Academy Awards, dominated the early 2000s.
And finally, the age extremes. Oldest and youngest
winners. The oldest person to win a competitive
Oscar is screenwriter James Ivory. He won for
Best Adapted Screenplay for Call Me By Your Name
when he was 89 years old. Wow, 89. And the youngest?
Tatum O 'Neill. She won Best Supporting Actress
for the movie Paper Moon back in 1974. She was
only 10 years old at the time. 10 years old.
Incredible. Shows that talent can really hit
at any age. Well, this has been quite the journey.
We've really gone behind the curtain of this
massive institution. From that tiny 15 -minute
dinner in 1929 where everyone knew the results.
Right, to this huge, heavily regulated, globally
televised spectacle where fortunes are made and
lost on campaign strategies. We saw the statue
itself, the icon. Started as plaster during the
war, but its value now is so protected by that
quirky $1 buyback rule. Yeah, and the voting
system's evolving from simple headcounts to complex
rank -choice methods, all while the academy grapples
with commercial pressures, diversity demands,
and technological shifts. So for you, the listener,
understanding all this, the eligibility rules,
the L .A. County requirement, the campaign spending,
the $12 ,500 platform fee, the historical biases,
the category politics, it really changed. is
how you see Oscar season, doesn't it? Absolutely.
You realize it's not just about artistic merit
in a vacuum. It's a game with very specific rules,
high stakes, and powerful gatekeepers. You're
instantly more informed about the real dynamics.
Which brings us to our final provocative thought
for you to chew on. The Academy is making very
public moves lately, pushing diversity and membership,
finally adding categories like casting and stunts,
trying to crack down on category fraud. They
seem to be opening up. Right. Those are positive
signals addressing longstanding criticisms. But
at the same time, they're reinforcing these really
strict, expensive structural barriers, that mandatory
geographically limiting L .A. County theatrical
run, that five figure fee just to get your film
seen by voters on their platform. Hurdles that
disproportionately affect smaller, independent
and international films without massive studio
backing. Exactly. So the question to leave you
with is this. Are these recent reforms genuinely
widening the Academy's embrace to find the best
films from anywhere in the world? Or are the
deep -seated commercial requirements and structural
hurdles still the biggest, perhaps even insurmountable,
barriers keeping truly diverse global cinema
from reaching that golden stage?