Enjoy your old school oscar while you can because, in three years, everything about them It’s going to be different.
This week, It was learned that in 2029The Academy Awards will change venues, from the Dolby Theater on Hollywood Blvd. to the (currently called) Peacock Theater downtown. The movement coincides with news from last year that, in that same year, The show will air on YouTube instead of ABC.
The stream moving to YouTube is one thing. The physical event that takes place from the center of Hollywood, just meters from the world famous TCL Chinese Theater and the Hollywood Walk of Fame, is another. The new theater is part of LA Live, a primarily commercial area centered around Crypto.com Arena, the home of the Los Angeles Lakers, Kings and Sparks. It’s only about eight miles away, but, in Los Angeles, it might as well be a million.
I’m a Los Angeles resident and having the Oscars at the Dolby made sense. Sure, they’d only been there since 2002, but the whole area was built around it and was basically intended for that. Pillars along the hallways had spaces to honor Oscar winners in future decades. Tourists could take photos where the stars walk the red carpet and then take photos with their hands in their handprints and with their stars on the street. Basically, for better or worse, the Oscars were held in Times Square in Los Angeles. The most Hollywood place in Hollywood.
Downtown LA Live just doesn’t have the same reverence. Maybe when there is a big event at the nearby Crypto.com Arena, things can get electric. But on a normal day, there are only chain restaurants and a movie theater. Plus, there’s not much else to do in the immediate area other than big events.
The news also revealed that the Peacock will undergo major technical upgrades to help accommodate the event. And the space has several thousand more seats than Dolby (about 3,400 at Dolby and about 7,100 at Peacock), so it will greatly increase energy (and access). So it’s not all bad. But it’s just a shocking turn of events that goes against tradition.
However, the move apparently gives a little more excitement to the next two Oscars, in 2027 and 2028. They will be the last two times they will be in this place where history was made, again and again. But come 2029, it will be a whole new awards show.
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