MARCH 24 • 2022 | 47

ARTS&LIFE
FILM

NATE BLOOM COLUMNIST
It’s Oscars Time!
It’s Oscars Time!

T

he Academy Awards ceremony will 
be broadcast (ABC) on Sunday, 
March 27 (8 p.m.). There have 
been major changes this year. Oscar cere-
mony viewership has been down in recent 
years, and ABC successfully leaned on the 
Academy to virtually drop eight “lesser” 
categories from the main ceremony. 
ABC put a sugary spin on the change. 
They said fewer “live awards” will allow 
more time for musical and comedic bits 
and, overall, reduce the time of the broad-
cast. 
This year, the presentation and accep-
tance of “lesser” category Oscars will 
take place an hour before the main 
ceremony. An edited-for-time tape of 
the presentation of these Oscars will 

be worked-into the main, live cere-
mony broadcast. The “lesser” catego-
ries are Documentary Short Subject, 
Film Editing, Live Action Short Film, 
Animated Short Film, Make-up and 
Hairstyling, Original Score, Production 
Design and Sound. 
Dozens of major Hollywood figures, 
including Steven Spielberg, 75, protested 
this change. They said it was “demean-
ing and threatened the future of the 
Academy.”
This year marks the return of offi-
cial Oscars’ ceremony host(s). In 2018, 
the Academy selected comedian Kevin 
Hart to host, but dropped him when old 
homophobic tweets of his surfaced. For 
the last three years, the Academy tried 

“no host” Oscars awards, and that was a 
critical and ratings fiasco.
What viewers want is a host or hosts 
who are funny and can ad lib “funny” 

The most complete guide to Jewish Oscar nominees, 2022 edition.

Amy Schumer

BY MARIO SANTOR 

continued on page 48

