| 79th Academy Awards | |
|---|---|
 Official poster | |
| Date | February 25, 2007 |
| Site | Kodak Theatre Hollywood,Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Hosted by | Ellen DeGeneres[1] |
| Preshow hosts | Chris Connelly Lisa Ling[2] André Leon Talley[3] Allyson Waterman[4] |
| Produced by | Laura Ziskin[5] |
| Directed by | Louis J. Horvitz[6] |
| Highlights | |
| Best Picture | The Departed |
| Most awards | The Departed (4) |
| Most nominations | Dreamgirls (8) |
| TV in the United States | |
| Network | ABC |
| Duration | 3 hours, 51 minutes[7] |
| Ratings | 39.92 million 23.59% (Nielsen ratings)[8] |
The79th Academy Awards ceremony, presented by theAcademy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), honored the bestfilms of 2006 and took place February 25, 2007, at theKodak Theatre inHollywood,Los Angeles beginning at 5:30 p.m.PST / 8:30 p.m.EST. During the ceremony, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences presented Academy Awards (commonly referred to as Oscars) in 24 categories. The ceremony, televised in the United States byABC, was produced byLaura Ziskin and directed by Louis J. Horvitz. ActressEllen DeGeneres hosted for the first time.[9] Two weeks earlier in a ceremony at theBeverly Wilshire Hotel inBeverly Hills, California held on February 10, theAcademy Awards for Technical Achievement were presented by hostMaggie Gyllenhaal.[10]
The Departed won four awards, includingBest Picture.[11][12] Other winners includedPan's Labyrinth with three awards,Dreamgirls,An Inconvenient Truth, andLittle Miss Sunshine with two, andBabel,The Blood of Yingzhou District,The Danish Poet,Happy Feet,The Last King of Scotland,Letters from Iwo Jima,The Lives of Others,Marie Antoinette,Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest,The Queen, andWest Bank Story with one. The telecast garnered nearly 40 million viewers in the United States.
The nominees for the 79th Academy Awards were announced on January 23, 2007, at theSamuel Goldwyn Theater inBeverly Hills, California, bySid Ganis, president of the Academy, and the actressSalma Hayek.[13]Dreamgirls received the most nominations with eight, andBabel came in second with seven.[14] This marked the first and only occurrence that the film with the most nominations was not a Best Picture nominee.[15]
The winners were announced during the awards ceremony on February 25, 2007.[16] With his latest unsuccessful nomination for Best Actor,Peter O'Toole became the most nominated performer without a competitive win.[17] Best Supporting Actress winnerJennifer Hudson became the fifteenth person to win for their debut film performance.[18] "I Need to Wake Up" fromAn Inconvenient Truth became the first song from a documentary film to win Best Original Song.[19]
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Winners are listed first, highlighted inboldface, and indicated with a double dagger (‡).[20]
The following 19 films received multiple nominations: | The following five films received multiple awards:
|
The following individuals presented awards or performed musical numbers.[23][24][25]
| Name(s) | Role | Performed |
|---|---|---|
| William Ross | Musical arranger | Orchestral |
| Pilobolus | Performers | Interpretive depictions of films' titles and logos |
| Jack Black Will Ferrell John C. Reilly | Performers | "Comedian at the Oscars" |
| Steve Sidwell Sound Effects Choir | Performers | "Elements & Motion" film sound effects performance |
| Randy Newman James Taylor | Performers | "Our Town" fromCars |
| Melissa Etheridge | Performer | "I Need to Wake Up" fromAn Inconvenient Truth |
| Celine Dion | Performer | "I Knew I Loved You" during theEnnio Morricone tribute |
| Jennifer Hudson Beyoncé Knowles Anika Noni Rose Keith Robinson | Performers | "Love You I Do", "Listen" and "Patience" fromDreamgirls |
Because of the declining viewership of recent Academy Awards ceremonies, producerGil Cates declined to helm the upcoming festivities. The Academy sought ideas to revamp the show while renewing interest with the nominated films. In September 2006, the Academy selected producerLaura Ziskin to oversee production of the telecast for a second time.[26] Nearly three months later, actress and comedianEllen DeGeneres, who had previously emceed threePrimetime Emmy Award ceremonies between 2001 and 2005, was chosen as host of the 2007 ceremony.[1] In an article published in theLos Angeles Times, Ziskin explained the decision to hire DeGeneres saying "Certainly, I believe the presence of Ellen will help the ratings absolutely. She's popular with a very wide audience. She is not a niche performer. She touches a lot of demographics."[27]
AMPAS christened this year's telecast with a theme celebrating movie quotes.[28] In tandem with the theme, advertising agencyTBWA\Chiat\Day designed the official ceremony poster featuring 75 quotes from several Oscar-nominated or winning films.[29] To stir interest surrounding the awards, filmmakerSpike Lee released a trailer featuring everyday people aroundNew York City reciting famous film lines.[28] During the ceremony, a montage produced by directorNancy Meyers saluted the work of screenwriters and their contributions to film.[30][31]
During the telecast, formerU.S. Vice President and environmental activistAl Gore, and Best Actor nomineeLeonardo DiCaprio announced that AMPAS would incorporate several environmentally and ecologically conscious features into the ceremony.[32] Designed by Frank Webb and Matthew White, theArchitectural Digest greenroom where presenters and winners mingled backstage featured several environmentally friendly features such as a rug made of recycled plastic bottles and walls painted without anyvolatile organic compounds.[33] Other eco-friendly features included the transportation for guests of the awards viahybrid electric vehicles, usage of recyclable paper for ballots and invitations, and serving meals at the Governor's Ball on reusable plates and biodegradable dishware.[34]
Several other people participated in the production of the ceremony.William Ross served as musical director for the ceremony.[35]J. Michael Riva designed a new set and stage design for the ceremony.[36] Voice actorDon LaFontaine was hired withGina Tuttle as announcers for the telecast.[37] ActorGreg Vaughan andLucky columnist Allyson Waterman co-hosted "Road to the Oscars", a weekly behind-the-scenes video blog on the Oscar ceremony website.[4] Members of the dance troupe and contortionist groupPilobolus performed interpretive shadow figures representing scenes and logos from the nominated films.[38] ActorsJack Black,Will Ferrell, andJohn C. Reilly performed a lighthearted musical number written by comedic directorJudd Apatow and music composerMarc Shaiman satirizing comedy's lack of recognition at the Academy Awards.[39] Conducted by musicianSteve Sidwell, theSound Effects Choir performed voice effects to a montage of classic films.[40] Another vignette directed by documentary filmmakerErrol Morris featuring several Oscar nominees discussing what it means to be an Oscar nominee was shown at the beginning of the show.[41] Italian directorGiuseppe Tornatore assembled a tribute highlighting previous winners of theBest Foreign Language Film.[42] FilmmakerMichael Mann produced a montage highlighting American life through the eyes of cinema.[43]
At the time of the nominations announcement on January 23, the combined gross of the five Best Picture nominees was $244 million with an average of $48.7 million per film.[44]The Departed was the highest earner among the Best Picture nominees with $121.7 million in domestic box office receipts. The film was followed byLittle Miss Sunshine ($59.6 million),The Queen ($35.6 million),Babel ($23.7 million) and finallyLetters from Iwo Jima ($2.4 million).[44]
Of the top 50 grossing movies of the year, 29 nominations went to nine films on the list. OnlyThe Pursuit of Happyness (12th),Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (15th),The Devil Wears Prada (16th),The Departed (17th) andDreamgirls (28th) were nominated for Best Picture, Best Animated Feature or any of the directing, acting or screenwriting awards.[45] The other top 50 box office hits that earned nominations werePirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (1st),Cars (2nd),Superman Returns (6th) andHappy Feet (8th).[45]
The show received a mixed reception from media publications. Some media outlets were more critical of the show. Tim Goodman of theSan Francisco Chronicle lamented, "It was long. It was flat. And it was bloated. Worst of all, it was boring." He also wrote that "it was difficult for Ellen's subtle rambling to translate because people want pop and humor and declarative sentences in their Academy Awards. Which they didn't exactly get."[46]The Denver Post television critic Joanne Ostrow bemoaned, "Pleasant and innocuous but hardly exciting, DeGeneres forgot the primary Academy Award host directive: It's not about the host. Hollywood's biggest night (and television's second-biggest annual gathering, after theSuper Bowl) is a celebration of film."[47]The Washington Post columnistTom Shales gave an average review for DeGeneres but criticized the overall slow and choppy pacing of the program noting that it was "punishingly too long."[48]
Other media outlets received the broadcast more positively. ColumnistAlessandra Stanley ofThe New York Times lauded DeGeneres's performance writing that she was "cheeky but good-natured, far less barbed and sardonic thanJon Stewartlast year orChris Rock in2005." She added that her style brought a "casual Friday mood to Fancy Sunday."[49]St. Louis Post-Dispatch television critic Gail Pennington praised host DeGeneres and producer Ziskin for turning "the evening into an upbeat celebration––and the most entertaining Oscars in years."[50] Television editor Dave Kronke of theLos Angeles Daily News gave high marks for DeGeneres commenting, "Her material was amusing but scarcely a laugh riot, yet it was amiable and delineated that the evening was a celebration of all the nominees, not just the winners."[51]
The American telecast on ABC drew in an average of 39.92 million people over its length, which was a 2.5% increase from the previous year's ceremony.[52][53] An estimated 76.72 million total viewers watched all or part of the awards.[8] The show also drew higherNielsen ratings compared to the previous ceremony with 23.59% of households watching over a 38.86 share.[54] In addition, the program scored a higher 18-49 demo rating with a 14.18 rating over a 33.71 share among viewers in that demographic.[55]
In July 2007, the ceremony presentation received nine nominations at the59th Primetime Emmys.[56] Two months later, the ceremony won two of those nominations for Outstanding Art Direction (J. Michael Riva, Geoffrey Richman, and Tamlyn Wright) and Outstanding Music Direction (William Ross).[57][58]
The annual "In Memoriam" tribute, presented by actressJodie Foster, honored the following people:[24]
Before the montage was shown, Foster briefly eulogized casting director and Oscar winnerRandy Stone who died nearly two weeks before the ceremony.[59]
