July 2, 2002
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: John Pavlik - (310) 247-3000

Academy Board Approves 75th Awards Rules

Beverly Hills, CA - Rules for the 75th Academy Awards^® have been approved by the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences with the governors making it tougher to give honorary awards.

The procedure by which governors vote for honorary awards — the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award, the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award and the Honorary Award — will now require a vote of two-thirds of the governors present to give an award, and three-fourths of the governors will have to endorse a candidate for a second award. Nominating and voting for all three awards will be conducted as a single procedure.

The move is an attempt by the board to limit the number of honoraries presented each year to one, or, at most, two, and to do so in a way that is fair to each of the three types of award.

Other changes include:

• deletion of the requirement that devices and inventions must be employed in the motion picture industry during the awards year to be eligible for consideration for scientific and technical awards
  
  
• simplification of the category names for the writing awards. The “Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published” category will now be known as the “Adapted Screenplay” category. “Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen” will now be called “Original Screenplay.”
  
  
• excluding from consideration in the short documentary category films that are reedited versions of earlier feature-length documentaries.
  
  
• buttressing of the Academy’s resolve to restrict Best Picture nominations and awards to producers who actually functioned as producers. If a nominated picture has more than the permissible three credited producers, and they can’t agree among themselves which three should be the nominees, the Producers Branch Executive Committee, which arbitrates in such cases, now has the option of identifying fewer than three producers as nominees.

The official “75th Annual Academy Award^® Rules” booklet will be ready for distribution to Academy members during the first week of August.

Academy Award rules are reviewed annually by branch and category committees, and submitted to the Awards Rules Committee, which then reviews all proposed changes and presents its recommendations to the Board of Governors.

The 75th Annual Academy Awards Presentation will be telecast live from the Kodak Theatre at Hollywood & Highland^™ by the ABC Television Network at 5:30 p.m., PST, on Sunday, March 23, 2003.