The Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has selected March 5, as the date for the 78th Academy Awards in 2006, Academy president Frank Pierson announced. The show will fall a week later in the calendar than in 2004 and 2005.
Pierson described the step back into March as a one-year expedient to avoid a conflict with the closing ceremonies of the 2006 Winter Olympics, which are scheduled to fall on the Academy's natural date of Feb. 26. It didn't seem fair to make viewers have to choose between these two special events, he said.
At the same time he emphasized that the Academy is very pleased with what had originally been characterized as a two-year experiment in moving the Awards presentations almost a month earlier than in the past. Pierson said that late-February broadcasts of the Oscars would resume in 2007.
The 2006 and 2007 broadcasts, as well as 2005's 77th Awards on Feb. 27, will be carried, as they have for the most recent 30 years, live by ABC.
Rick DeMott
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