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OSCAR NIGHT–FEBRUARY 27, 2011 83rd Academy Awards
The 83rd Academy Awards will take place Sunday, February 27, 2011 at Hollywood’s Kodak Theatre. Founded in 1927 by 36 of the most influential men and women in the motion picture industry at the time, the Academy is an honorary membership organization whose ranks now include more than 6,000 artists and professionals. Dedicated to the advancement of the arts and sciences of motion pictures, the Academy’s corporate management and general policies are overseen by a Board of Governors, which includes representatives from each of the craft branches. Best known as the organization behind the movie industry’s most prestigious honor, the Oscar, the Academy encourages excellence in filmmaking through a range of coveted awards. While the Oscar statuette – a symbol admired around the world – acknowledges the very highest level of achievement, every form of Academy recognition, be it a certificate, plaque or other form of trophy, carries significance like none other in the world of movies. They are the more than 6,000 artists and professionals who bring the magic of the movies to life. They are the men and women who transport audiences to galaxies far away and to worlds long ago and who create the previously unimagined for the big screen. They are the entertainment industry’s preeminent filmmakers. They are Academy members.
In early 1927, during dinner at the home of M-G-M’s studio chief Louis B. Mayer, Mayer and three of his guests – actor Conrad Nagel, director Fred Niblo and producer Fred Beetson – began talking about creating an organized group to benefit the entire film industry. They planned another dinner for the following week, with invitees from all the creative branches of the film industry. And so, on January 11, 1927, 36 people met for dinner at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles to hear a proposal to found the International Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (“International” dropped from the name soon after). Attendees included many of the biggest names in the industry at the time: Mayer, Mary Pickford, Sid Grauman, Jesse Lasky, George Cohen, Cecil B. DeMille, Douglas Fairbanks, Cedric Gibbons and Irving Thalberg. The group supported the concept and things came together quickly. By mid-March of that year, articles of incorporation were presented and the first officers were elected, with Douglas Fairbanks as president. On May 11, 1927, a week after the state granted the Academy a charter as a non-profit organization, an official organizational banquet was held at the Biltmore Hotel. Of the 300 guests, 230 joined the Academy, paying $100 each. That night, the Academy also awarded its first honorary membership, to Thomas Edison. Initially five branches were established: producers, actors, directors, writers and technicians.
The Academy rented a suite of offices at 6912 Hollywood Boulevard as temporary headquarters for the first few months. In November 1927, headquarters moved to office space on the mezzanine level of the Roosevelt Hotel at 7010 Hollywood Boulevard. By April 1929 the Academy had installed screening facilities in the Roosevelt’s Club Lounge, equipping the space with Vitaphone, Movietone and other sound systems, which set the stage for the Academy to host advance screenings of not-yet-released motion pictures (held mainly for key opinion-makers of the day, including church and educational leaders). In June 1930, the Academy rented a suite of offices at 7046 Hollywood Boulevard to give more space for the increased staff of four executives, three assistants and six clerks. The Academy’s operations remained at that location until 1935, when the accounting and executive offices moved to the Taft Building on the corner of Hollywood and Vine, and the library was relocated to 1455 North Gordon Street.
One of the first Academy committees was Awards of Merit. The seven-person committee suggested to the Board in 1928 that awards be presented in 12 categories. The first Academy Awards were officially presented at a black-tie dinner at the Roosevelt on May 16, 1929, honoring achievements between August 1, 1927 and July 31, 1928.
The Academy published its first book in 1928 – Report on Incandescent Illumination, based on a series of Academy-sponsored seminars attended by 150 cinematographers. A second book, Recording Sound for Motion Pictures, was published in 1931, based on a lecture series on sound techniques. In 1930 the Academy developed a program to train Signal Corps. officers in the various aspects of motion picture production for the purpose of producing military training films. Years later at the start of World War II, the Academy’s Research Council arranged for major studios to produce training films on a non-profit basis. Over 400 training shorts and related featurettes were delivered to the armed services. A new Academy publication, the Screen Achievement Records Bulletin, debuted in 1934 when the Writers Branch began publishing a bulletin of screen authorship records. It listed film production titles and complete credits for directors and writers. In the late 1920s and the 1930s the Academy was active in industry politics and labor-management issues, with mixed results. In 1937, during Frank Capra’s time as president, the Academy rewrote its bylaws and moved further away from involvement in labor-management arbitrations and negotiations. In 1937 the Academy Players Directory was published. It included photos of actors and the name of their agent or industry contact. The directory was published by the Academy until 2006, when it was sold to a private concern. By 1938 the Academy’s Research Council, a forerunner of today’s Science and Technology Council, had 36 technical committees working to address issues related to sound recording and reproduction, projection, lighting, film preservation and cinematography. By 1941, the Academy library had gained acclaim for having one of the most complete motion picture-related collections in the world. In 1946 the Academy purchased the Marquis Theater building at 9038 Melrose Avenue as its new headquarters. The building had a 950-seat theater (the site of the 1948 Academy Awards) and space for staff offices and the ever-growing library holdings.
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