On Sunday, March 15 the 98th Academy Awards will take place in Los Angeles. We have a look at the Academy and the history of what once was one of the most-watched TV shows.
At the first ceremony in 1929, the winners had been announced three months before. From 1930-1940 the Academy kept the results secret but gave an advance list to newspapers to enable next-day publication. This was discontinued after the Los Angeles Times published the winners in its evening edition in 1940.
The sealed-envelope system began in 1941.
Today’s Academy basics
The nonprofit Academy was founded in May 1927 by 36 people of film prominence, including Louis B. Meyer, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks. Today, membership in the Academy is by invitation of the 55-person Board of Governors, the governing body of the Academy, and is limited to those who have distinguished themselves in the motion picture industry.
Members representing the many professional areas within the motion picture industry are organized into 19 branches. Here are the branches and how many members are in each (11,104 total).
Actors: 1,307
Animation: 746
Casting directors: 183
Cinematographers: 367
Costume designers: 211
Directors: 634
Documentary: 736
Executives: 812
Film editors: 442
Makeup artists and hairstylists: 267
Marketing and public relations: 732
Music: 438
Producers: 721
Production design: 506
Production and technology: 448
Short films: 229
Sound: 685
Visual effects: 723
Writers: 544
Artist representatives: 271 (not a branch)
24% of the members live outside the U.S.:
43 in Africa
309 in Asia
1,683 in Europe
334 in North America beyond the U.S.
217 in Oceania
113 in South America
Note: International broadcasts began in 1969
Formally the statures are called the ‘Academy Award of Merit,’ and nicknamed ‘Oscar.’
Standing at 13.5 inches tall and weighing a solid 8.5 pounds, these iconic awards are crafted from solid bronze and plated in 24-karat gold.
More than half of movie-watching adults (56% in a May 2025 survey) say they waited to watch a movie at home when it was out of theaters using a subscription service, but without paying extra.
Best Picture and box office
“Titanic” won Best Picture in 1997 and made more than $2 billion worldwide at the box office. It’s not often that top-grossing films are also favored by the Academy.
Film, studio and # of nominations
“Bugonia,” Focus, 4 nominations
Domestic: $17.7 million
Worldwide: $38.8 million
“F1,” Apple, 4 nominations
Domestic: $189.6 million
Worldwide: $631.7 million
“Frankenstein,” Netflix, 9 nominations
No box office totals reported by Netflix.
“Hamnet,” 8 nominations
Domestic: $15.3 million
Worldwide: $28.2 million
“Marty Supreme,” A24, 9 nominations
Domestic: $80.6 million
Worldwide: $100.5 million
“One Battle After Another,” Warner Bros., 13 nominations
Domestic: $71.6 million
Worldwide: $206.1 million
“The Secret Agent,” Neon, 4 nominations
Domestic: $2.6 million
Worldwide: Not available
“Sentimental Value,” Neon, 9 nominations
Domestic: $4.3 million
Worldwide: Not available
“Sinners,” Warner Bros. 16 nominations
Domestic: $280 million
Worldwide: $368.3 million
“Train Dreams,” Netflix, 4 nominations
No box office totals reported by Netflix.
Note: “Sinners” 16 nominations is the most of any film.
Sources: The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Box Office Mojo, Internet Movie Database, Nielsen Media Research Inc., Variety, TV Guide, The Associated Press