The Academy Awards

 The Academy Awards, or "Oscars", is an annual American awards ceremony hosted by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which is a professional, honorary organization with the stated goal of advancing the arts and sciences of motion pictures. This organization was formed in 1927 and 2 years later the awards were presented for the first time at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. If you don’t know what the Oscars are about let me explain it to you. It is the ceremony where actors, actresses, directors and many others involved in film are nominated. If they win they are awarded the copy of a statuette, officially called the Academy Award of Merit, which has become commonly known by its nickname "Oscar".

 

The awards ceremony was first broadcast on the radio in 1930 and televised in 1953. It has now been seen live in more than 200 countries and can be streamed live online. A total of 2,947 Oscars have been awarded since the inception of the award through the 87th ceremony (2015).

 

The Oscars are the oldest entertainment awards ceremony. Its equivalents, the Emmy Awards for television, the Tony Awards for theatre, and the Grammy Awards for music and recording, are modeled after the Academy Awards.

 

The 88th Academy Awards was held at the Dolby Theatre and hosted by Christopher Julius "Chris" Rock III who also hosted the 77th Academy awards in 2005 and returned as host for this year’s ceremony. They explained why they brought Rock back as host, saying, "Chris Rock is truly the MVP of the entertainment industry. Comedian, actor, writer, producer, director, documentarian — he's done it all. He's going to be a phenomenal Oscar host!”. In this year´s ceremony he talked about the “black people” and “white people”, the differences and kind of racism, which is all around us. Find his speech on the Internet; he had so much to say. Of course in funny way!

 

The telecast garnered in a mere 34 million viewers in the United States, making it the least watched Oscar ceremony since the 80th Academy Awards in 2008.

 

There are 24 various categories in which there is only one winner for each. The Revenant received the most nominations with a total of 12, with Mad Max: Fury Road coming as the second with 10 and receiving 6 awards.

 

Alejandro G. Iñárritu, who directed “The Revenant”, became the only Mexican and the third director to win two consecutive Oscars for Best Director

 

There were other winners as well:

 

Best Picture: “Spotlight”

 

Best Actor: Leonardo DiCaprio, “The Revenant”

 

Best Actress: Brie Larson, “Room”

 

Best Supporting Actor: Mark Rylance, “Bridge of Spies”

 

Best Supporting Actress: Alicia Vikander, “The Danish Girl”

 

Best Original Screenplay: “Spotlight,” Josh Singer and Tom McCarthy

 

Best Adapted Screenplay: “The Big Short,” Charles Randolph and Adam McKay

 

Best Song: “Writing’s on the Wall,” from “Spectre,” Jimmy Napes and Sam Smith

 

Best Foreign Language Film: “Son of Saul” (Hungary)

 

Best Animated Feature: “Inside Out”

 

Best Documentary Feature: “Amy”

 

(You can find the other winners and a complete list of the nominations at http://oscar.go.com/ )

 

Hollywood's biggest night never fails to bring out the best and the brightest stars, and this year was no exception! We could see so many dresses by so many different worldwide known designers. Oscar-nominee Jennifer Lawrence (“Joy”) made headlines on the red carpet with her Oscar dress. While she is notorious for falling down at the awards ceremony, Jennifer escaped tripping over her dress this year. She was stunning.

 

Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, who famously starred as Jack and Rose in the “Titanic”, gave fans a treat by walking down the red carpet together wearing matching black outfits.

 

Leonardo DiCaprio was first nominated in 1993 at the age of 19 (it seems to me that every single person was more talented at the age of 19 than I will ever be J). Since then, he’s been nominated five times since. Leo finally joined the ranks of Oscar winners this year (as we all hoped would happen, since we saw him in Titanic). In his speech he was thankful to the Academy, to all people in the room, to the team, parents and friends. DiCaprio also brought attention to global warming. He stated, "Climate change is real. It is happening right now. It is the most urgent threat facing our entire species. We need to work collectively together and stop procrastinating."

 

So this year’s Oscars were not just about the beautiful dresses, nominations and the awards. This guy was not afraid to talk about the problem causing climate change, which lead to the melting of icebergs. We are the ones who can change this. We are the ones who have caused this problem. It’s our turn to fix it.