29th Academy Awards
During the 29th Academy Awards, the regular competitive category of Best Foreign Language Film was introduced, instead of only being recognized as a Special Achievement Award or as a Best Picture nominee (as in 1938). The first winner in this new category was Federico Fellini's La Strada with Anthony Quinn and a second nomination for Best Original Screenplay. Its win would help spur an interest in foreign-language films. Another Fellini film, Nights of Cabiria would win the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar in the following year.
29th Academy Awards | |
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Date | March 27, 1957 |
Site | RKO Pantages Theatre Hollywood, California NBC Century Theatre New York City, New York |
Hosted by | Jerry Lewis Celeste Holm |
Produced by | Valentine Davies |
Directed by | Bill Bennington Max Miller |
Highlights | |
Best Picture | Around the World in 80 Days |
Most awards | Around the World in 80 Days and The King and I (5) |
Most nominations | Giant (10) |
TV in the United States | |
Network | NBC |
This was also the first year that all of the five Best Picture nominees were in color. It was also the first Oscar telecast to be videotaped for later broadcast, especially for those network affiliates that didn't want to broadcast the event live.
All of the major awards winners were large-scale epics – Mike Todd's Around the World in 80 Days, The King and I, Anastasia, George Stevens' Giant, Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments (the highest-grossing film of the year), King Vidor's War and Peace and William Wyler's Friendly Persuasion. And the trend toward blockbusters and colorful spectaculars was established for years to come, with The Bridge on the River Kwai, Gigi, and Ben-Hur being subsequent Best Picture champions.
The Best Original Story category had two interesting quirks this year. First, the Oscar for Best Original Story for The Brave One was awarded to Robert Rich, a pseudonym of Dalton Trumbo, who was blacklisted at the time and thus unable to receive credit under his own name. Second, Edward Bernds and Elwood Ullman withdrew their names from consideration in this category for their work on High Society, as the nomination had been intended for the musical starring Grace Kelly, while Bernds and Ullman had instead written a Bowery Boys film of the same name. In fact, the nomination was a double mistake, as High Society was based on the play and film The Philadelphia Story and probably would not have qualified as an original story anyway.
James Dean became the only actor to receive a second posthumous – and consecutive – nomination for acting.
Ingrid Bergman was not present to collect her award for Best Actress: Cary Grant accepted it on her behalf. She did, however, list the nominees for Best Director via a pre-recorded segment from a rooftop in Paris. The winner was announced by host Jerry Lewis.
Director John Ford's classic western The Searchers, widely seen as one of the best American films of all time, failed to receive a single nomination.
This was the second time since the introduction of the Supporting Actor and Actress awards that Best Picture, Best Director, and all four acting Oscars were given to different films. This would not happen again until the 78th Academy Awards. Around the World in 80 Days became the sixth film to win Best Picture without any acting nominations.
Awards
Winners are listed first and highlighted in boldface.[1]
Academy Honorary Award
- Eddie Cantor "for distinguished service to the film industry".
Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award
Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award
Presenters and performers
Presenters
- Carroll Baker (Presenter: Best Original Song)
- Ingrid Bergman (Presenter: Best Director)
- Ernest Borgnine (Presenter: Best Actress)
- Gower Champion and Marge Champion (Presenters: Art Direction Awards)
- Dorothy Dandridge (Presenter: Best Visual Effects)
- Kirk Douglas (Presenter: Best Film Editing)
- Janet Gaynor (Presenter: Best Motion Picture)
- Rock Hudson and Eva Marie Saint (Presenters: Best Musical Score and Best Dramatic or Comedy Score)
- Nancy Kelly (Presenter: Best Supporting Actor)
- Deborah Kerr (Presenter: Writing Awards)
- Jack Lemmon (Presenter: Best Supporting Actress)
- Anna Magnani (Presenter: Best Actor)
- Dorothy Malone (Presenter: Best Sound Recording)
- Mercedes McCambridge and Robert Stack (Presenters: Documentary Awards)
- Patty McCormack and Mickey Rooney (Presenters: Short Subject Awards)
- George Seaton (Presenter: Best Foreign Language Film, Honorary Award, the Irving G. Thalberg Award and the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award)
- Elizabeth Taylor (Presenter: Costume Design Awards)
- Claire Trevor (Presenter: Cinematography Awards)
Performers
- Bing Crosby ("True Love" from High Society)
- Dorothy Dandridge ("Julie" from Julie)
- The Four Aces ("Written on the Wind" from Written on the Wind)
- Gogi Grant ("Que Sera, Sera (Whatever Will Be, Will Be)" from The Man Who Knew Too Much)
- Tommy Sands ("Friendly Persuasion (Thee I Love)" from Friendly Persuasion)
Multiple nominations and awards
These films had multiple nominations:
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The following films received multiple awards.
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See also
References
- "The 29th Academy Awards (1957) Nominees and Winners". Oscars.org (Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences). Archived from the original on July 6, 2011. Retrieved 2011-08-21.