Barbenheimer Gives the Oscars Some Much Needed Juice
After losing viewers for most of the past three decades, the annual telecast may get a boost this year, thanks to the Oppenheimer-versus-Barbie rivalry.
An Oscar statuette decoration at the 96th Oscars Governors Ball Preview at Ovation Hollywood in Los Angeles on March 5.
Photographer: Michael Buckner/Getty Images
This story is the second in a series we’re calling Déjà Vu, highlighting how events making headlines today have played out differently in the past—and what that may tell us about the future. Read the first story here.
For much of the early history of the Academy Awards, films that enjoyed major success at the box office, such as The Sound of Music and The Godfather, also tended to win big at the annual event. Having widely known, successful features among the nominees translated into huge audiences for the annual Oscars broadcast, which became one of modern television’s signature events. But in recent years, films outside Hollywood’s blockbuster industrial complex have dominated the prestigious best picture and best director categories. In the past decade, every best picture winner was produced for less than $25 million, and the top-grossing of those winners—2018’s Green Book—collected only $320 million in ticket sales, a modest haul compared with that year’s highest-grossing film, Avengers: Infinity War from Walt Disney Co.’s Marvel Studios, which made $2 billion.