Prime time high

Oscars’ telecast audience revised up, highest in 14 years

WINNERS ALL: Matthew McConaughey, Cate Blanchett, Lupito Nyong’o and Jared Leto pose with their Oscar awards

The audience that tuned in to watch ABC’s live telecast of the Oscars hosted by Ellen DeGeneres on Sunday was the show’s highest in 14 years after ratings were upwardly revised.
Nielsen ratings data on Tuesday showed that the audience for the telecast was 43.7 million, versus the 43 million reported on Monday, the highest since 2000 and 8 per cent higher than last year. The Oscars attract the biggest non-sports audience in the United States. Walt Disney Co’s ABC network has signed on to broadcast the film industry’s highest honours through 2020.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences kept producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron for the second straight year, but swapped out Seth MacFarlane as host after his provocative humor prompted harsh criticism. Comic and daytime talk show host DeGeneres, who hosted in 2007 and is only the second woman to emcee Hollywood’s biggest night on her own, brought an easy breezy style to the Dolby Theatre, though she did poke the powerful people in the room.
The best news for ABC might have been the numbers in the more youthful segments, considering the challenges of bringing a younger audience to an old-school awards show. The audience in the 18-49 age rose one per cent from 2013 to a four-year high, but the 18-34 audience was 3 per cent higher and teen viewers 12-17 were up 13 per cent from last year.

Ellen’s Oscar ‘selfie’ crashes Twitter, breaks record

Is this the year the ‘selfie’ stole the Oscars? A self-portrait of host Ellen DeGeneres and stars including Meryl Streep, Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper taken during Hollywood’s annual Academy Awards ceremony quickly became the most shared photo ever on Twitter.
“We got an email from Twitter and we crashed and broke Twitter. We have made history,” DeGeneres said shortly after access to the social media site was disrupted due to sharing of her star-studded picture. Kevin Spacey, Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie and new Oscar winner Lupita Nyong’o, also crowded into the picture, which was snapped by Cooper after DeGeneres mingled with stars seated in the audience. “I’ve never tweeted before!” Streep, a three-time Oscar winner, gushed after Cooper snapped the photo with a mobile device.
DeGeneres shared the selfie via her Twitter feed here It was shared, or retweeted, more than 2 million times in some two hours during the broadcast of the 86th annual Academy Awards.
The photo surpassed the record set by U.S. President Barack Obama’s ‘Four More Years’ re-election victory shot. The picture of Obama hugging first lady Michelle Obama on election night in 2012 has been retweeted more than 780,000 times. Other widely shared photos from Sunday’s Oscars included a DeGeneres selfie with Liza Minnelli, taken after the host made a biting comment about the appearance of the veteran actress and Broadway star.

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