2.03.2023 15:56
(Akt. 2.03.2023 15:56)
This is the story of Hollywood’s most eligible man, the Oscar.
©Valerie MACON / AFP (icon image)
He’s fast approaching 100 and shirtless still relies on testosterone-heavy masculinity, but he’s still the most coveted man in Hollywood even in modern times: the Oscar. This is his story.
After a facelift in 2016, the knightly symbol of victory, weighing a good 3.8 kilos, appears once more in detail as it did in 1929 – the year when the history of the Oscars began.
This is the most coveted man in Hollywood: the Oscar
To be precise, the history goes back two years longer. At that time, a passage from the statutes at the constitutive meeting of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on May 11, 1927 was formulated in a way that was both laconic and momentous for cinema: “We will advance the art of film and film technology by awarding prizes for outstanding individual achievements become.”
First award of the Oscars on May 16, 1929
So on May 16, 1929, the statuettes designed by Cedric Gibbons, head of the art department at MGM, were presented for the first time. Back then, however, there was no talk of the glamor that the event exudes today. The winners were known months in advance and some of the statues had already been picked up. Also, only 270 stars and journalists turned up at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. Douglas Fairbanks completed the award ceremony accordingly quickly: in the record time of four minutes and 22 seconds. The secrecy of the winners was introduced the following year.
The little golden man was only given the name Oscar in 1939
What was also missing at the time: the name Oscar. The little gold man only got his nickname later, although it is controversial where it came from. The most common story is that Academy librarian-turned-principal Margaret Herrick was reminded of her uncle Oscar. In any case, the Academy officially used the pet name for the first time in 1939.
Winning an Oscar meant two million dollars more for a study
At that time, the golden boy had already achieved some success. Especially in economically turbulent times and during the Second World War, many Americans longed for entertainment. As early as the 1940s, winning an Oscar in one of the main categories meant additional income of one to two million dollars for a studio. Not least because of this, the economic pressure that the recession-stricken studios put on the Academy at the time became legendary. At the Oscar itself, however, you had to save during the shortage economy in the world war. During this time, only plaster statuettes were awarded, which were exchanged for “real” Oscars following the end of the war.
The Oscars were first televised in 1953
Although the studios had long put up a fight once morest the emerging television competition, the first television broadcast of an Oscar ceremony in 1953 marked a milestone in television history: the show, moderated by the future US President Ronald Reagan, achieved the highest ratings since its introduction on television. Since then, the gala has long been a reliable quota generator on TV, but the number of viewers has recently fallen massively. The Oscar broadcast in 2021 reached its absolute low point with only 10.4 million people in the USA, even if there was a significant increase in the previous year with 16.6 million.
The Oscars Gala has rarely been postponed
The gala has only rarely been postponed, for example in 1938 because of a flood disaster, in 1968 because of the assassination of Martin Luther King, in 1981 because of the assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan and in 2021 because of the corona pandemic, when the awards were resized and moved to April. The Oscars also came under the spotlight politically: in the repressive years of the McCarthy era, there were official blacklists of artists branded as communists who were not allowed to win an Oscar. At the same time, the actors began to use their popularity to make political statements: improvised and planned speeches on topics such as the oppression of Native Americans, the Vietnam War and Palestine shaped the Oscar nights as a mirror of America’s turbulent political development.
Triumph of commercial cinema with “Ghostbusters” and “Indiana Jones”
That only changed when films like “Ghostbusters”, “Indiana Jones” or “Beverly Hills Cop” heralded the triumph of commercial cinema in the 1980s. At first, the Academy did not award the main trophies to those suitable for the masses, until in the 1990s cinema successes and Oscar winners began to match once more: At the latest when “Titanic” equaled the record of “Ben Hur” (eleven Oscars in 1959) in 1997, blockbuster cinema had finally arrived in the Oscar Olympus.
Since the 2010s, there has been a backlash into politics
Since the 2010s, however, there has been a certain political backlash, with the Oscar nights addressing the lack of attention paid to Afro-American filmmakers under #OscarsSoWhite, the speakers reliably taking a stand once morest then-President Donald Trump and using the keyword #MeToo killed numerous representatives in the debate sexual assaults and abuse of power in the film system. The view also became more diverse in terms of content, as the victory of the parable “Parasite”, shot in South Korean, in the top category Best Film 2020 marked a change, in the footsteps of which the nomination of the German anti-war film “Nothing New in the West” is following this year.
Oscars will also be held at the Dolby Theater in Los Angeles in 2023
In any case, find them Oscarzeremonie This year, as has almost always been the case since 2002, the specially designed building, now known as the Dolby Theater, is just a block from the historic Roosevelt Hotel, where the first trophies were presented in 1929. Compared to the 5,600-seat Shrine Auditorium, which was previously often the venue for the gala, the almost 3,400 seats there represent a severe shortage. In 2021, in the wake of Corona, the much smaller Union Station in downtown Los Angeles was relocated. In the meantime, however, you have arrived back in your home country.
All information regarding the 95th Oscars
