Oscars to go hostless as film academy desperately tries to shorten mammoth ceremony
- Announcement comes after Kevin Hart decided to step down from hosting the ceremony following online backlash about old homophobic tweets
- The academy won’t replace him as it tries to cut down the lengthy ceremony that had terrible audience viewership last year
Following weeks of speculation, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has finally confirmed that this year’s Oscars ceremony will not have a host.
“The producers, I think, wisely decided to not have a host and to go back to having the presenters and the movies be the stars, and that will be the best way [to] … keep the show to a brisk three hours,” says Karey Burke, entertainment chief at ABC, the network that will carry the show.
The academy announced its intentions to limit the telecast to three hours last August, a few months before Burke was hired. That change seemed to be a reaction to a continuing decline in viewership, as last year’s nearly four-hour telecast dropped 19 per cent in viewers from the prior year’s and hit an all-time low of only 26.5 million viewers.
Nonetheless, the ceremony’s director went on to win an Emmy in September. The announcement also included a controversial new category recognising achievement in “popular film”, which the academy delayed after a significant amount of backlash.
This year’s Oscars ceremony seems to have been shaped by public fury more than any other in recent history. Soon after comedian Kevin Hart was named host in early December, several of his old homophobic tweets and jokes resurfaced, sparking widespread outrage.
He issued an apology and eventually backed out, went on Ellen DeGeneres’ talk show and said he’d reconsider the gig after she vouched for him, but eventually backed out again.
