The Academy Awards attracted its smallest U.S. television audience ever on Sunday, according to Nielsen data reported by Walt Disney Co.'s ABC network, tracking a similar slide for other recent award shows and sports events.
Live TV broadcasts remain relatively attractive for advertisers because watchers cannot skip commercials, with prices for Oscars ad spots climbing despite 2017 viewership, which was the smallest in nine years.
The nearly four-hour live show averaged 26.5 million total viewers, according to Nielsen data in an ABC statement, down from 32.9 million in 2017 and below the 32 million in 2008, now the second-least watched year.
The figures do not include digital and mobile viewing.
Advertisers covet live audiences because they are more likely to view commercials than those watching recorded shows and events, driving pricing higher even as viewership shrinks. ABC owns broadcast rights for the Oscars through 2028.
The 90th Oscars, still expected to be 2018's most-watched nonsporting U.S. television event, honored romantic fantasy "The Shape of Water" as best picture.
The event built on the socially conscious tone of its past few years with themes of female empowerment and activism, but lacked any shocking moments like 2017's best picture mix-up.
Late night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel, host for the past two years, skewered industry-roiling sexual misconduct allegations and reports of gender-based pay disparities, while best actress winner Frances McDormand called for "inclusion riders" to boost Hollywood diversity.
ABC sold out its ad inventory for Sunday's Oscars broadcast and charged $2.6 million on average for a 30-second spot, a person with knowledge of the matter said.
That was a jump from $1.91 million in 2017, according to research firm Kantar Media, which said ABC generated $128 million from the 2017 telecast.
The Grammy Awards in January attracted 26.1 million television viewers, its smallest audience since 2006. February's Super Bowl professional football championship, the most-watched telecast of the year, saw its viewership decline 7 percent from a year earlier to 103.4 million.
ABC offered the live show on abc.com and the ABC app to those with a participating cable or satellite subscription in certain markets. It was also available on live TV services that stream ABC.
The telecast attracted 18.9 percent of viewers in 56 major markets, according to Nielsen’s preliminary overnight metered market household ratings, an ABC spokesman said earlier on Monday, down from 22.4 percent last year.
source: news.abs-cbn.com
MVP, five-time NBA champion, and now, an Academy Award winner.
Kobe Bryant added another trophy to his vast collection on Sunday, as his ode to the sport, "Dear Basketball," won the Oscar for Best Animated Short.
The animated short was based around the poem that Bryant wrote to announce his retirement after 20 years of playing for the Los Angeles Lakers, first published on The Players Tribune.
In its brief review, Variety wrote that Bryant's work "packs a powerful emotional punch," thanks in part to the music by John Williams.
"It’s strange, yet surprisingly effective to witness Bryant’s familiar profile transformed into an adorable, Disney-style kiddo via animation legend Glen Keane’s loose graphite drawings," Peter Debruge wrote ahead of the Oscars.
"We see cute, cartoon Kobe sitting on the bed, clutching a basketball as big as his head, dreaming of a pro sports career in precisely the way his success has inspired so many others."
source: news.abs-cbn.com
LONDON -- Gary Oldman's Oscar win on Sunday for his portrayal of Winston Churchill in "Darkest Hour" is a triumph for a versatile actor more used to playing villains and rogues than heroic statesmen.
The 59-year-old British actor, who famously portrayed Sex Pistols star Sid Vicious in "Sid and Nancy" (1986), made his name as a bankable movie star playing antagonists.
He goes to great lengths to develop his characters and ploughed through books, newsreel footage and even sat in Churchill's chair to play the World War II leader as he became Britain's prime minister in May 1940.
Oldman is known for his signature "big" acting -- a very physical, over-the-top style developed for the stage, used to great effect for his villainous cinema characters and retained for other roles.
His portrayal of Churchill in "Darkest Hour" had already landed him the best actor Golden Globe -- and the Oscar, which comes on his second nomination, now seals his reputation as one of the finest actors working today.
"I would just like to salute Sir Winston Churchill, who has been marvelous company on what can be described as an incredible journey," Oldman told the Oscars audience on Sunday.
Previously, he had said he welcomed all the accolades, but that the greatest reward was receiving approval from Churchill's descendants.
"Randolph just loves the portrayal. And he feels, 'Oh, you've captured my great-grandpapa -- the humour, the energy.'
"That's my Oscar, right there," he told CNN.
Becoming Churchill
In winning the Academy Award, Oldman defeated a tough field: Timothee Chalamet ("Call Me by Your Name"); Daniel Day-Lewis for "Phantom Thread"; Daniel Kaluuya for "Get Out"; and Denzel Washington for "Roman J. Israel, Esq."
Oldman's prior best actor Oscar nomination came in 2012 for his portrayal of melancholy British agent George Smiley in an adaptation of the John le Carre thriller novel "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy".
Building the part of Churchill, Oldman said he first concentrated on the voice, feeling that he physically looked nothing like the great statesman.
"He is such an icon and so mythologised, you wonder, can you get past the marble statue and reach the man?" he told CNN.
He was captivated by newsreel footage, noting the energy in Churchill's walk and the sparkle in his eyes, revealing an inner sense of humor.
Oldman toured parliament and Churchill's family homes and sat in the chair he used during World War II.
He noticed fingernail marks on the left arm and scratches from his ring on the right -- history recorded in the furniture -- which he took as signs of the stress Churchill was under, and incorporated it into his performance.
Breakthrough as Sid Vicious
Oldman left school at 16 and took a job in a sports shop.
Failing to get into the prestigious Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, he studied at Rose Bruford drama school in southeast London and spent a successful decade in theatre.
He burst onto the screen in 1986 with his critically acclaimed portrayal of punk rocker Vicious. He lost so much weight to play the Sex Pistols bassist that he was briefly hospitalized.
Oldman rose to prominence as a leading figure in the "Brit pack": the gang of up-and-coming British actors of the 1980s that included Day-Lewis, Colin Firth and Tim Roth.
He played Lee Harvey Oswald in "JFK" (1991), Count Dracula in "Bram Stoker's Dracula" (1992) and starred in "Leon" (1994) and "The Fifth Element" (1997).
He had recurring roles in the Batman "Dark Knight" trilogy and the "Harry Potter" series.
He also tried his hand at writing and directing, winning a host of awards in 1997 for "Nil by Mouth" -- a tale of drink, drugs and violence inspired by his own childhood on a south London housing estate.
Oldman's own father was, he says, an abusive alcoholic who left the family when his son was seven.
The actor had a well-publicized struggle with alcohol himself and it took a 70-hour drinking binge for him to realize his life was lurching out of control.
Oldman is now sober and in his fifth marriage, having tied the knot with Gisele Schmidt in 2017. He has three sons from previous marriages, though not from his two-year union with actress Uma Thurman.
source: news.abs-cbn.com
Producer J. Miles Dale (left), director Guillermo del Toro (at microphone) share the stage with the cast and crew of 'The Shape of Water' as they receive the Best Picture Award during the 90th Annual Academy Awards at the Dolby Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center on Sunday in Hollywood, California.
source: news.abs-cbn.com
HOLLYWOOD -- Hollywood's awards season reaches its glittering climax on Sunday at the Oscars, with fairy tale romance "The Shape of Water" and dark crime comedy "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri" neck-and-neck in the race for the major statuettes.
The ceremony caps a difficult few months during which the industry has declared war on the pervasive culture of sexual misconduct brought to light by the downfall of movie mogul and alleged serial sex attacker Harvey Weinstein.
As with the Golden Globes in January, the mood in Tinseltown on Sunday is expected to be celebratory but defiant as the film world's A-listers speak out against dozens of showbiz people called out for predatory behavior since October.
Peter Debruge, the chief film critic for Hollywood trade publication Variety, told AFP he expected this year's celebrations would place front and center an issue acknowledged for a long time as an "open secret" -- but never before handled.
"This year, now that the case has blown open, it's a totally different situation," he told AFP of the Weinstein scandal, ahead of Sunday's gala.
"I think we can expect jokes, we can expect political statements, we can expect any of the women who win to take that opportunity to kind of speak their minds."
The 90th Academy Awards -- hosted by late night funnyman Jimmy Kimmel -- will be beamed live around the world by ABC from Hollywood's Dolby Theatre.
With voting among the Academy's 8,500 members closed since Tuesday, the frenzied and at times schmaltzy campaigning that perennially marks the awards merry-go-round can no longer impact the results.
Organizers are looking to rebound after last year's flubbed announcement of the best picture winner -- the trophy was initially given to "La La Land," when the actual winner was "Moonlight."
"The Academy is certainly going to be on high alert to make sure that the people from PriceWaterhouse are not backstage tweeting and distracted, that you know the right envelopes go out," said Debruge.
"But at the same time, every once in a while, some human error like that can make a show really exciting."
'Emotional ointment'
With the #MeToo and Time's Up campaigns against sexual misconduct and gender inequality dominating the 2018 awards circuit, this year's Oscars is seen as an opportunity for the industry to support female filmmaking.
Greta Gerwig is only the fifth woman in Oscars history to be nominated for best director, but faces tough competition from Guillermo Del Toro, the favorite for "The Shape of Water," Christopher Nolan ("Dunkirk"), Jordan Peele ("Get Out") and Paul Thomas Anderson ("Phantom Thread").
There was also the first nod in history for a female cinematographer, Rachel Morrison, who shot Dee Rees's racial drama "Mudbound."
"The Shape of Water," a Cold War-set story of love between a mute cleaning woman and a mystery merman-like creature, tops the nominations with 13, one shy of the record.
It is vying for best picture, best director and best actress for its star Sally Hawkins, while Richard Jenkins and Octavia Spencer are in the running for supporting actor and actress.
"The most beautiful thing which I've heard... is that the movie has healed someone emotionally or has given someone an emotional ointment for the soul," Del Toro told AFP at a recent luncheon for Oscar nominees in Beverly Hills.
However, in a wide open race, it is expected to fall far short of the record 11 statuettes achieved by "Ben-Hur" (1959), "Titanic" (1997) and "The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" (2003).
Late charge
Tense World War II epic "Dunkirk" heads into Sunday's gala in second place with eight nods, while "Three Billboards" picked up seven nods.
Starring Frances McDormand, "Three Billboards" tells the story of a grieving mother who takes on the town's police while trying to call attention to a lack of progress in the hunt for her daughter's killer.
Buoyed by strong showings at the Golden Globes and Screen Actors Guild Awards, Martin McDonagh's film made a late charge to move back into pole position for the coveted best picture statuette.
Gold Derby, a site that collates the awards predictions of experts and members of the public, also has it as favorite in the best actress and supporting actor categories, with "The Shape of Water" ahead in best directing, production design and score.
"Dunkirk" was also a favorite in three races -- although all technical categories -- while Winston Churchill biopic "Darkest Hour" and Pixar animation "Coco" were expected to pick up two statuettes each.
"The Shape of Water" and "Three Billboards" will vie for best picture honors with seven other films, including "Dunkirk" and "Darkest Hour," and coming-of-age movies "Call Me By Your Name" and "Lady Bird."
Others in the coveted top category are dark satire "Get Out," Daniel Day-Lewis's apparent final film "Phantom Thread" -- he has announced his retirement -- and Pentagon Papers thriller "The Post."
McDormand, who has dominated the awards season, is expected to bag her second best actress statuette with no serious challenge from Hawkins, Margot Robbie ("I, Tonya"), Saoirse Ronan ("Lady Bird") or Meryl Streep ("The Post"), who notched her record 21st nomination.
For best actor, Gary Oldman is one of the surest bets of the night for his acclaimed performance as Churchill in "Darkest Hour."
source: news.abs-cbn.com
