70th Academy Awards

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70th Academy Awards
Date Monday, March 23, 1998
Site Shrine Auditorium
Los Angeles, California
Host Billy Crystal
Producer Gil Cates
Director Louis J. Horvitz
TV in the United States
Network ABC
Duration 3 hours, 45 minutes
Ratings 57.25 million
35.32 (Nielsen ratings)

The 70th Academy Awards were noted for their high ratings and the 11 wins racked up by the Best Picture, Titanic. Billy Crystal hosted the ceremony for the sixth time, and received an Emmy award for his performance.

Although the evening was dominated by Titanic, the picture notably did not receive any awards for its actors' performances. Other pictures picked up the acting awards; Good Will Hunting, which was nominated for 9 awards and won 2; L.A. Confidential, which was nominated for 9 awards and won 2; and As Good As It Gets, which was nominated for 7 awards and won 2.

Due to the popularity of Titanic, which was still the #1 movie at the box office at the time, the show earned its highest ratings ever in history based on audience size (57.25 million), though the highest rated show based on percentage of households watching was in 1970.

Contents

[edit] Notable quotes

[edit] The awards

For a complete list of nominees and winners, see: 70th Academy Awards nominees and winners

[edit] Feature films

  • Best motion picture of the year: Titanic
  • Best foreign language film of the year: Character

[edit] Acting

[edit] Honorary Oscars

Stanley Donen received an honorary Oscar for his years as a director on such musicals including Singin' in the Rain.

[edit] Writing

[edit] Direction

[edit] Technical awards

[edit] Documentaries

[edit] Music

[edit] Short Films

[edit] Special events

  • As a celebration of 70 years of Oscar, the Academy showed clips of all the films that won Best Picture in the past 70 years. The Academy also invited 70 Oscar winning actors and the camera went face to face announcing the actor or actress and the film they won the Oscar for and the year as well.
  • Mike Myers introduced a montage of film clips featuring animal actors. The final clip of the montage was a growling shot of Bart the Bear (a large kodiak bear) from the film The Edge. A curtain then rose to reveal Bart on stage, wearing a bow tie and holding a wooden "envelope", which Myers was to retrieve from the bear before presenting the next award. Returning to the microphone, Myers quipped "I just soiled myself."
  • Fay Wray made a special guest appearance. Billy Crystal introduced a small film of her work in RKO's King Kong (1933) and then he climbed off the stage, standing next to Miss Wray, and announced her presence. He described her as the "Beauty who charmed the Beast" and the "Legendary Fay Wray". A surprised Miss Wray rose from her seat to instantaneous rapturous applause and waved to the whole surprised and thrilled audience.

[edit] In memoriam

Presented by Whoopi Goldberg. The Academy takes a special moment to remember those involved with motion pictures that died in the previous year. Those that were featured: Lloyd Bridges, Richard Jaeckel, composer Saul Chaplin, cinematographer Stanley Cortez, William Hickey, screenwriter Paul Jarrico, screenwriter Dorothy Kingsley, hairstylist Sydney Guilaroff, editor William H. Reynolds, Billie Dove, oceanographic filmmaker Jacques Cousteau, Stubby Kaye, Red Skelton, producer Dawn Steel, Toshiro Mifune, Brian Keith, Chris Farley, executive Leo Jaffe, director Samuel Fuller, Burgess Meredith, J.T. Walsh, Robert Mitchum and James Stewart.

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