Both Hollywood and the body that hands out the Oscars, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, have stumbled their way through the last 12 months along with the rest of us. The pandemic forced mass closures of movies theaters across the globe, and in response, studios shuffled and reshuffled their release schedules while A.M.P.A.S. changed its Oscar eligibility rules and pushed back the awards ceremony from February to April. There might not be a literal asterisk next to this year’s winners, but with fewer and different films competing than were expected plus a 14 rather than a 12 month qualifying window and what’s shaping up to be another awkward hybrid production, the Oscars are in a tough spot.
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It’s practically part of the annual tradition now for Oscar fans to lament the award show’s declining viewership and relevance. Audiences have been shrinking. The broadcast once reliably drew more than 40 million viewers, making it one of the most watched — and thus valuable to advertisers — events besides the Super Bowl. But since 2014, those numbers have been nearly cut in half. Of course, decreases in TV ratings have been observed across the board over the same time period, as streaming services have been embraced by a larger percentage of the home-viewing public. Still, the pandemic seems to have affected live award shows in a dramatically negative and measurable way.
The Emmys were the first major entertainment award ceremony to attempt a socially distanced live presentation, and though the quirky final result was surprisingly well-received, Emmy ratings hit a record low. The Golden Globes, Critics Choice Awards and Grammys all suffered similar or worse fates. Globes viewership fell from 18.3 million in 2020 to 6.9 million in 2021. That’s not a downward trend, it’s a fall off a cliff. The Oscars are bracing for a ratings disappointment, and if it happens, it can’t be blamed on the rise of streamed content anymore.
There are two possible explanations for what feels like the sudden demise of the awards show. When the reality became clear that theaters would be shuttered for a significant period of time, most studios wiped their blockbusters and some of their top-tier Oscar contenders from the 2020 calendar. Black Widow, No Time to Die and F9 plus In the Heights, Dune, Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story and dozens more were all postponed. The types of movies that make a billion dollars at the box office maintain the public’s interest in movies in general, and in many years, at least one film that nearly everyone’s seen, such as Avatar or Black Panther, competes for Best Picture. However in the past year, movies took a backseat to TV because of COVID-19 and it likely will take some time for a balance to be re-established. That’s all to say, interest in movies and in the Oscars themselves has, understandably, diminished.
Except, that doesn’t explain the Emmys, Grammys and Golden Globes’ poor ratings. In the case of television especially, with most of the world spending a majority of their time at home, often in front of screens, it seems there should’ve been an increase in interest and awareness. This can be attributed to the public’s mood. Awards for artistic merit are, of course, completely subjective and not actually necessary — ever, let alone in the middle of a crisis. The formal ceremonies that heap praise on celebrities can feel out of touch to some audiences in a normal year. In 2020, anti-celebrity sentiment began to take hold for a variety of valid and not-to-valid reasons. During a time of so much struggle, pain, fear and uncertainty, the public self-congratulation of a privileged group can almost seem distasteful. That’s a notion awards bodies — in particular, the self-serious Oscars — have had to work hard to counteract.
As always happens the morning after, the 2021 Oscars will be dissected. Pundits will ask: Were the jokes funny? Were the speeches moving? How many people watched? Does anyone care? The answers to those last two questions are likely to be: not many and not really. The Academy has some daunting obstacles to overcome, as does the film industry itself.
The silver lining in all of this is the films of 2020 and early 2021 were pretty good! For the first time in a long time, Oscar experts and movie buffs seem content. Oscar nominees like Nomadland, Minari, Judas and the Black Messiah, Sound of Metal and Promising Young Woman are getting much-deserved attention both from the Academy and from home audiences that they might not have in a typical year. It’s not just that the field is less crowded; these films would be worthy of nominations in any year. Without as much advertising and in-person campaigning, it feels like the real cream rose to the top this time around (with some noted exceptions). That most of the nominees are available on-demand or via streaming might not help Oscar ratings, but it’s been great for the films themselves, a number of which were made by women and people of color on extremely small budgets.
Even if most people don’t tune into the ceremony, they’ll still hear and read about the winners the next morning, which will send millions more viewers to check out the films of directors like Chloé Zhao, Lee Isaac Chung, Shaka King and Emerald Fennell. The Oscars exist for the sake of preservation and advocacy, and regardless of the show’s ratings, they still have the chance to elevate some excellent films from this pandemic year.
The 93rd annual Academy Awards will be held live on Sunday, April 25 on ABC.
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