..HISTORY OF THE CEREMONY..
When the first Academy Awards were handed out on May 16, 1929; movies had just begun to talk. That first ceremony took place during a
banquet held in the Blossom Room of the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. The attendance was 250 and tickets cost $10.
Unlike today's ceremony, suspense was in short supply. Back then, the winners were known prior to the banquet. Results were given
in advance to the newspapers for publication at 11 p.m. on the night of the Awards. In 1940, guests arriving for the affair could actually
buy the 8:45 p.m. edition of the Los Angeles Times and read the winners. As a result, the sealed-envelope system was adopted
the next year and remains in use today.
Interest in the Academy Awards has always run high, though not at today's fever pitch. While the first presentation escaped the media,
an enthusiastic Los Angeles radio station covered the second banquet during a live one-hour broadcast. Every presentation since
then has had broadcast coverage.
The first 15 Award presentations were banquet affairs held first in the Blossom Room, then at the Ambassador and Biltmore hotels.
After 1942, increased attendance and World War II made banquets impractical, and the Awards moved to theaters, where they've been held since.
The 16th Awards ceremony was held at Grauman's Chinese Theater and was covered by network radio for the first time and broadcast
overseas to American GI's. After three years at Grauman's, the Awards moved to the Los Angeles Shrine Auditorium.
In March 1949, the 21st Awards were held in the Academy's own Melrose Avenue Theater. For the next 11 years the Awards were held at the RKO
Pantages Theater in Hollywood. It was there, on March 19, 1953, that the presentation was first televised. The NBC-TV and radio network
carried the 25th Academy Awards ceremonies live from Hollywood with Bob Hope emceeing and from the NBC International Theater
in New York with Fredric March making the presentations. In 1961, the Awards moved to the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium and for the
next 10 years the ABC-TV and radio network handled the broadcasting duties.
The Oscars were first broadcast in color in 1966. From 1971 through 1975 NBC carried the Awards. ABC has televised the show since 1976
and is under contract through 2008.
On April 14, 1969, the 41st Academy Awards ceremonies moved to the brand new Dorothy Chandler Pavilion of the Music Center of Los
Angeles County. It was the first major event for this world-renowned cultural center.
The Awards remained at the Music Center until 1987, when they returned to the Shrine Auditorium for the 60th and 61st Awards. Subsequently
the Awards moved back and forth between the Shrine and the Music Center. The Shrine Auditorium, with seating for 6,000, was used mainly
to accommodate as many Academy members as possible; the Music Center seats only about 2,500. The Awards returned to Hollywood
for the 2001 (74th) Awards Presentation at the state-of-the-art 3,300-seat Kodak Theatre.
The need for special awards
In the first year, Janet Gaynor was the lone woman among 15 Award winners. In the second year, only seven awards were given — two for
acting and one each for Best Picture, Directing, Writing, Cinematography and Art Direction. Since then, the Awards have grown
slowly and steadily in both the size of its audience and the fields of achievement covered.
The need for special awards beyond standard categories was recognized from the start. Two were awarded for the 1927/28 year: one went to
Warner Bros. for producing the pioneer talking picture, THE JAZZ SINGER, and the other went to Charlie Chaplin for producing,
directing, writing and starring in THE CIRCUS.
In 1934, three new categories were added: Film Editing, Music Scoring and Best Song. That year also brought a write-in campaign to nominate
Bette Davis for her performance in OF HUMAN BONDAGE. The Academy now forbids write-ins on the final ballot. Price Waterhouse
(now known as PricewaterhouseCoopers) signed with the Academy that year and has been employed ever since to tabulate and ensure
the secrecy of the results.
In 1936, the first Supporting Actor and Actress Oscars were given to Walter Brennan for COME AND GET IT and Gale Sondergaard for
ANTHONY ADVERSE, respectively. The following year saw the first presentation of the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award, which went
to Darryl F. Zanuck. The Special Effects category was added in 1939 and was first won by THE RAINS CAME.
In 1941, the documentary film category appeared on the ballot for the first time. The Academy brought foreign countries into the field of
Oscar recognition in 1947, with a Special Award going to the Italian film, SHOE-SHINE. The following year the Academy placed Costume
Design on the ballot. The Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award was established in 1956 and presented to Y. Frank Freeman. In 1963, the
special effects award was split into two: Sound Effects and Special Visual Effects. Makeup was added in 1981, along with the Gordon E.
Sawyer Award for technological contributions. In 2001, the first Animated Feature Oscar was awarded.
The scheduled Awards ceremony has been interrupted three times. The first was in 1938 when floods all but washed out Los Angeles and
delayed the ceremonies one week. The Awards ceremony was postponed two days in 1968 out of respect for Dr. Martin Luther King, whose funeral
was held on April 8, the day set for the Awards. And the Awards were postponed for 24 hours in 1981 due to the assassination
attempt on President Ronald Reagan.
Attendance at the Annual Academy Awards is by invitation only. No tickets are put on public sale.
