Amy Schumer, Regina Hall and Wanda Sykes will host the 94th Academy Awards this year, Variety reported on Monday. The trio of female comedic actors, who are expected to be formally announced on Good Morning America on Tuesday, will be the struggling show’s first hosts since 2018.
Schumer, Hall and Sykes are tasked with providing some zest for a program whose ratings have flagged in recent years. Viewership for last year’s scaled-backed ceremony, held in Los Angeles’s Union Station, fell by more than half from the previous year, which itself was a record-breaking low.
In an attempt to juice up interest in what is traditionally Hollywood’s biggest night, the Academy hired a new producer, Girls Trip film-maker Will Packer, who in recent weeks has met with a laundry list of talent for the role as emcee.
And in a bid to include audiences put off by small-market films, the Academy announced Monday that Twitter users will be able to vote on their favorite films, regardless of whether it’s nominated, with the hashtag #OscarsFanFavorite. The top-voted film by 3 March will receive recognition at the ceremony on 27 March, and three Twitter users will be selected to present at the Oscars in 2023.
A “super-event” loophole will allow the ceremony, which will return to its standard Dolby Theater, to not require vaccinations; guests will instead have to provide a negative PCR test or a negative rapid antigen test on the day of the event.
It’s as yet unclear how this year’s ceremony will work – Variety reported that Packer has toyed with a three-act structure – and none of the hosts have spoken about the job publicly. But in Schumer, Hall and Sykes, he’s booked veteran talent with broad appeal.
Schumer, who will star in the 10-episode Hulu series Life & Beth later this year, has been nominated for 12 primetime Emmy awards, and won outstanding variety sketch series in 2015 for Inside Amy Schumer. Hall, who starred in Packer’s Girls Trip, has appeared in the Scary Movie franchise films, starred in the series Black Monday, and anchored films such as The Hate U Give and Little. Sykes, a veteran stand-up comedian and writer, won her first primetime Emmy in 1999 for her writing on the Chris Rock show and is known for roles on Curb Your Enthusiasm, the New Adventures of Old Christine, and Black-ish.
The Power of the Dog, Jane Campion’s repressed western on Netflix, leads the pack for the 2022 Oscars with 12 nominations, including nods for stars Benedict Cumberbatch, Kirsten Dunst, Jesse Plemons and Kodi Smit-McPhee. It’s followed by Dune, Denis Villeneuve’s adaptation of Frank Herbert’s sci-fi novel, with 10 nominations. Steven Spielberg’s update of West Side Story and Belfast, Kenneth Branagh’s black-and-white autobiographical coming-of-age tale, follow with seven nominations each.
This article was amended on 15 February 2022 to correct the number of Amy Schumer’s Emmy nominations. She has been nominated for 12 awards, not won 12 awards.
