February 26, 2008

Don't Expect Hollywood to Learn from Academy Awards Broadcast Bomb

By Pamela Meister
So Sunday's  OscarTM broadcast was, underwhelmingly, a television ratings bomb. Not even the allure of Tinseltown's beautiful people walking down the red carpet in free gowns and borrowed jewels could tempt Americans to tune into what's known as the biggest self-congratulatory backslapping event in the history of mankind.Early Nielsen numbers indicate that there were 14% fewer viewers than the last Oscar dud in 2003 (33 million that year).I can only recall one instance of my watching the Oscars within the past 20 years: 1993, when Clint Eastwood's film Unforgiven won best picture. I've never been much of an awards show fan anyway. The occasion sticks out because I was a new mother at the time, perpetually short on sleep, and I resented the fact that I had to stay up so darn late to see the big finale.Maybe other Americans are catching on to the idea that having to sit up until nearly midnight when work beckons the next day, only to discover that a film they hadn't seen...(Read Full Article)