Oscars Telecast Highlights Crafts a Year After Sidelining 8 Categories

Carolyn Giardina
·1 min read

From the opening montage of the 2023 Oscars, the Academy signaled an effort to place attention on the crafts, following last year’s widely criticized decision to present eight categories prior to the live telecast and instead including clumsily-edited excerpts from those presentations in the live broadcast.

As part of this change, a film camera was featured on the Dolby Theatre stage as part of the cinematography presentation, which was introduced with a nod to Gregg Toland’s lensing of Citizen Kane, while host Jimmy Kimmel carried a boom at one point, offering a salute to sound pros. Additionally, short clips were introduced showing the recipients of the Academy’s SciTech Awards, which were presented on Feb. 24, including Gordon E. Sawyer Award winner, lens designer Ian Neil.

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Those with a keen eye in the audience at the Dolby might have noticed that during the presentation of film editing Oscar, the woman on stage operating the Avid as part of the presentation was Taylor Joy Mason. Mason was an assistant editor of last year’s Oscar-winner Dune and last weekend won her first American Cinema Editors’ Eddie Award as part of the editing team on A Black Lady Sketch Show.

The editing segment featured an Avid Media Composer, a classic Moviola film editing system, and a display highlighting past Oscar winners in film editing, including Thelma Schoonmaker and Dune editor Joe Walker.

Walker’s category was one of those relegated to the “golden hour” a year ago. So too were the winners of the categories for best score, makeup and hairstyling, production design, sound, animated short, documentary short and live action short.

For more from the Academy Awards, see the star-studded Oscars red carpet arrivals.

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