The 89th iteration of the Academy Awards is set to kick off this Sunday, February 26 live at 8:30PM ET / 5:30PM PT with host Jimmy Kimmel from the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, California. This year’s celebration of excellence in motion pictures will be broadcast to terrestrial television by way of ABC and by way of the internet to not a whole lot of other destinations.
In an TV environment that’s seen double-digit ratings declines for more than a few awards shows and a movie-going environment where no one’s seen any of the nominees, you’d think ABC and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences would want to broaden its distribution to potentially attract as many eyeballs as possible to the live event (like Fox did with its Super Bowl LXI distribution plans).
Instead, ABC is only allowing viewers in one handful of markets (“Chicago, Fresno, Houston, Los Angeles, New York City, Philadelphia, Raleigh-Durham and San Francisco”) who subscribe to a “participating TV provider” and viewers in another handful of markets (Albuquerque, Boston, Ft. Smith/Fayetteville, Jackson (Mississippi), Kansas City, Milwaukee, Monterey-Salinas, Oklahoma City, Omaha, Pittsburgh, Portland-Auburn (Maine), Savannah and West Palm Beach) who subscribe to DirecTV to access the broadcast online.
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Meanwhile, the denizens of the more than one-in-five households that have cut the cord (and don’t have one of these) won’t be able to see an uninterrupted broadcast of the main event, but will be able to check out The Oscars: All Access companion show. The peripheral live stream will be distributed on Facebook (without an embed option, or else you’d see the video embedded here), Oscars.com, the ABC app, ABCNews.com and a variety of Xfinity devices and online destinations.
All Access will be helmed onscreen by Chris Connelly, Troy Gentile, and Adnan Virk along with 20 cameras and footage from the red carpet, backstage at the main event, and inside the Dolby Theatre.
“Working with Facebook to extend the reach of ‘The Oscars: All Access’ enables us to further drive water cooler discussion and encourage people to tune in to the live awards show broadcast,” said Disney-ABC Television Group’s EVP of Digital Media, Strategy, and Business Development John Frelinghuysen in the release.
We’ll see if that encouragement works, or if it just gives less potential viewers the means by which to tune in.
