Academy ‘ready for anything’ with new ‘crisis team’ at Oscars

WASHINGTON. For the first time in 95 years, the Oscars will be assisted by a “crisis team”.

Motion Picture Academy chief executive Bill Kramer revealed that the awards show will be “ready for anything” with a new crisis team. The announcement was in response to last year’s infamous Oscar slap when Will Smith slapped Chris Rock during the televised ceremony.

“Things don’t always go according to plan,” Kramer told TIME magazine. “But we have a whole crisis team, which we never had, and a lot of plans. We’ve worked through a lot of scenarios.”

Kramer, who took over the Academy of Film and Science last July, told the magazine that the surprise 2022 incident “opened our eyes to a lot of things that could happen at the Oscars.”

According to Kramer, the Academy’s “crisis team” is made up of public relations teams able to “get together very quickly” to act as a spokesperson or make a statement.

“So we hope to be ready for anything that we are not expecting right now but are planning for just in case it happens,” the CEO added.

During the Oscars dinner on February 17, Janet Young, President of the Academy, expressed her regret over last year’s reaction to the surprise slap.

“I’m sure you all remember that we experienced an unprecedented event at the Oscars,” Yang told the crowd, which included Tom Cruise, Angela Bassett, Cate Blanchett and Steven Spielberg, during her opening remarks. “What happened on stage was completely unacceptable and the response of our organization was inadequate.”

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences did little in response to Smith storming the stage and slapping The Rock during or immediately after last year’s telecast. Almost two weeks passed before its board of governors voted to ban Smith from the Oscars and all other academic events for 10 years. Smith had already retired from his position as an academy member in advance.

Yang, who was not president at the time of the incident, was interrupted by light applause and didn’t go into details, moving on to more joyful topics.

The 95th Annual Academy Awards will take place on Sunday, March 12 at the Dolby Theater in Hollywood. The ceremony will begin at 8:00 pm EST and will be broadcast live on ABC.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.