The 96th Academy Awards ceremony, which was presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), took place on March 10, 2024, at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles.
During the gala, the AMPAS presented Academy Awards (commonly referred to as Oscars) in 23 categories honoring films released in 2023. The ceremony, which was televised in the United States by ABC, was produced by Raj Kapoor, Molly McNearney, and Katy Mullan, with Hamish Hamilton serving as director. Comedian Jimmy Kimmel hosted the show for the fourth time, following the 89th ceremony in 2017, the 90th ceremony in 2018, and the 95th ceremony in 2023.
In related events, the Academy held its 14th annual Governors Awards ceremony, hosted by John Mulaney, at the Ray Dolby Ballroom at Ovation Hollywood on January 9, 2024. The Academy Scientific and Technical Awards were presented by host Natasha Lyonne on February 23, 2024, at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles. An American Sign Language livestream was broadcast on the Academy’s YouTube page featuring video of interpreters.
Thirteen nominations
The nominations were announced on January 23. ‘Oppenheimer’ led with 13 nominations, followed by ‘Poor Things’ and ‘Killers of the Flower Moon’ with 11 and 10, respectively.
Oppenheimer won seven leading awards, including Best Picture.
Other major winners were ‘Poor Things’ with four awards and ‘The Zone of Interest’with two. ‘American Fiction’, ‘Anatomy of a Fall’, ‘Barbie’, ‘The Boy and the Heron’, ‘Godzilla Minus One’, ‘The Holdovers’, ‘The Last Repair Shop’, ‘20 Days in Mariupol’, ‘War Is Over! Inspired by the Music of John and Yoko’, and ‘The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar’ won an award each. The nominees for the 96th Academy Awards were announced on January 23, 2024, by actors Zazie Beetz and Jack Quaid at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills. The winners were announced during the awards ceremony on March 10, 2024.
The cultural phenomenon of “Barbenheimer” received a total of twenty-one nominations (eight for Barbie and thirteen for Oppenheimer). The two films competed against each other in six categories, including Best Picture.
Several notable nominees included Steven Spielberg, who extended his record for the most Best Picture nominations to thirteen; Martin Scorsese, who received his tenth nomination for Best Director, and became the oldest nominee in the category; Thelma Schoonmaker, who received her ninth nomination for Best Film Editing; composer John Williams, who received his 54th nomination; and Willie D. Burton, who received his eighth nomination as a below-the-line crew member.
First Oscar nominations
Ten actors received their first Oscar nominations this year. The acting nominees included portrayals from three openly LGBTQ+ actors: Colman Domingo, Jodie Foster, and Lily Gladstone. Gladstone also became the first Native American actress to be nominated. Scott George, who wrote the music and lyrics to “Wahzhazhe (A Song for My People)”, became the first member of the Osage Nation to be nominated for an Academy Award.
This was the fifth consecutive year with at least one Best Picture nominee directed by a woman: Greta Gerwig with Barbie, Celine Song with Past Lives, and Justine Triet with Anatomy of a Fall. Triet also became the eighth woman nominated for Best Director. Overall, six couples received nominations that they shared together in their respective categories.
Billie Eilish and Finneas O’Connell won Best Original Song, becoming the youngest two-time Oscar winners in history (22 and 26 years, consecutively) after also winning it during the 94th Academy Awards.
The Zone of Interest is the first foreign language film to win in the category for Best Sound and Godzilla Minus One is the first international film to win for Visual Effects.
For the first time in 21 years, The Boy and the Heron is now the second 2D animated film to win Best Animated Feature at the awards. Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer,” an unsettling look at the dawn of the atomic era, dominated the 96th Academy Awards on Sunday, winning seven prizes, including best picture and best director.
The film, which took on an added resonance at a time of international conflicts, also scored Oscars for Cillian Murphy’s haunted lead performance as J. Robert Oppenheimer and Robert Downey Jr.’s supporting turn as a vengeful bureaucrat.
“We made a film about the man who created the atomic bomb, and for better or for worse, we’re all living in Oppenheimer’s world,” Murphy noted in his acceptance speech.
And there were tangible reminders of that legacy, as well as of the global tumult that gave Nolan’s historical drama about the creation of the nuclear bomb its jolt of immediacy.
Protests
Blocks away from the Oscars red carpet, several hundred protesters called for a ceasefire to the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, while winners used their speeches to decry the humanitarian crisis in that region, along with the one sparked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The pro-Palestinian demonstrations in the heart of Hollywood snarled traffic around the Dolby Theatre, the venue where the show is held, resulting in a late start for the ceremony as A-listers scrambled to make it to their seats.
