The making of the Oscars' 'In Memoriam' segment

Sandy Cohen of the Associated Press has an interesting story about how the "In Memoriam" feature of the annual Academy Awards telecast is produced. Bruce Davis, the executive director of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, tells Cohen, "It is the single most troubling element of the Oscar show every year. Because more people die each year than can possibly be included in that segment."

This year's show airs Sunday at 5 p.m. PST on ABC, live from the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood. (The brilliant minds behind NBC's Olympic TV coverage might want to take a cue from ABC's LIVE broadcast.)

The Times' coverage of the Oscars can be found here. And the rest of Cohen's story for the Associated Press follows after the jump.

-- Claire Noland

LOS ANGELES -- The Kodak Theatre goes quiet as the big screen at center stage begins flashing images of actors and filmmakers who have died. A photo of Heath Ledger or Paul Newman might move the audience to spontaneous applause. Other images inspire deep sighs, as viewers reflect on the entertainers who have touched our lives.

The In Memoriam segment can be the most moving part of the Oscar telecast. It’s also the toughest to produce.

"It is the single most troubling element of the Oscar show every year," says Bruce Davis, executive director of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. "Because more people die each year than can possibly be included in that segment."

Davis’ office keeps a running list of academy members and others in the movie business who have passed since the previous year’s segment was compiled. Then, a few weeks before the awards, he and a small committee of academy officials whittle the list of more than 100 names down to the 30 or so folks who will be included in the show’s memorial — from the famous faces viewers at home are sure to recognize to the behind-the-scenes workers familiar only to academy members.

"It gets close to agonizing by the end," Davis says of the annual meeting. "You are dropping people who the public knows. It’s just not comfortable."

Oscar’s In Memoriam montage began in the early 1990s and other awards shows followed suit, including the Screen Actors Guild Awards, Grammys and Emmys — all of which go through the same painful process every year.

"It’s a killer because we have hundreds of members that pass each year and we can’t get them all in," says SAG Awards producer Kathy Connell.

The film academy gives its final list of in-memoriam honorees to the producer of the segment just days before the big show. Chuck Workman, who is producing the memorial montage for Sunday’s telecast, says he was working with a temporary list until last week.

Many of the names made the final cut, he says, but some did not.

"It’s a constant balance for the academy," says Workman, who has 20 years of experience making film montages for the Oscar show. "They do try their best, but there’s only so many spots."

Workman says his first step would normally be to choose "some schmaltzy music" to accompany the segment, but this year the music "is coming directly from something they’re doing for the show."

Workman’s task, then, is to find footage and photographs that best represent the 30 or so people in the memorial piece. He looks for images that "they would be proud of, their families would be proud of and the people in the audience would be proud of."

For Patrick Swayze, who died Sept. 14, Workman picked clips from "Dirty Dancing" and "Ghost."

But Workman notes that "In ’Ghost,’ you don’t want it to look too much like he died."

Using computers and digital editing software, he assembles the sequence like a puzzle.

"It’s very tricky," he says. "You want a good juxtaposition, but you don’t want it to be too cute. It’s really an honor to the people who died."

Davis, meanwhile, is already prepared for the calls he always gets after the show from family members upset that their loved one wasn’t included in the memorial piece.

"They’re brokenhearted sometimes," Davis says. "There’s nothing you can say that will make them feel better.

"I always hope that they take some comfort that the very fact that they worked in movies confers a certain amount of immortality ... and their work lasts longer than being briefly acknowledged in a short clip sequence at one show in one year."

Still, he takes the calls personally and feels the callers’ pain.

Davis says he’s "never had an enjoyable year" working on Oscar’s memorial segment. But it’s always worth it to pay tribute to those who have died.

"Even though I’ve been keeping the list as we went along, it’s always stirring to see it all assembled and just remember how much extraordinary work a list of 25 to 30 people may represent," he says. "It’s important because even though every given Academy Awards broadcast is about the year just past, this is a way of evoking the whole history of movies."

Photo: Oscar statuettes in waiting at the Kodak Theatre. Credit: Al Seib / Los Angeles Times  

Comments

[Eve]

I will never forgive those bozos for leaving out Anita Page last year--she starred in the first Oscar-winning talkie fer goodness sake!

[jayalb]

I agree with them on Dirty Dancng for Patrick Swayze, but his zest for life got me when he went skydiving out of the plane (no CG!) in point Break.

[Paula]

They could leave out some of the technical people - the public doesn't know them - or do split screen for them. The year George Harrison, Carroll O'Connor and Aaliyah died was the worst! They showed the same people twice! Aaliyah made one film, was known to only a handful of RB fans but I am sure was included only because she was a protege of Quincy Jones (an Academy member)

[Roy]

I don't like when they cut different music in and out. Last year was cool when Queen Latifah sang live as the montage rolled, but the director made the mistake of wide shots that didn't allow the viewers to see who was on screen

[Eve]

Seriously, TCM does a much better job each year with their annual Memorial segments. But then, to be fair, TCM gives it a good five-seven minutes. How long is the Academy's?

[Randi Rasmussen]

I am a little dissappointed in the fact that Farrah Faucet was not included inthis beautiful memoriam.

[MDEpstein]

I can't believe they left out Farrah Faucett either. We all yelled "what about Farrah?! at the end. I called friends and they were all asking the same question. She got about 2 hours of note when she died, before Michael Jackson stole the show.

[ron]

I wonder why Arthur Canton, Public Relations, was included, but Maurice Jarre (9 Oscar nominations and 3 wins) and Henry Gibson (nominated for his work in Nashville) were not.

[CAReader]

They "don't have time" to include very recognizable names like Farrah, and Bea Arthur? That's a whole buncha bunk. How about halving the amount of time they spend on ridiculous and largely unfunny opening monologues, NPH's fun but unnecessary song and dance gig, and a tribute to horror movies for what reason again?. The bottom line is that the decision makers at the Academy are a bunch of snobs, and leaving Farrah out was a deliberately determined omission.

[Clint Graves]

I had seen the clip more than once and Marice Jarre's image was shown but,not his name. The cowboy after him looked like Gene Barry.

[Thalia]

3/4 of the selections are male. Farrah played some nontraditional and provocative female roles - guess that's not to be rewarded by these guys.

[missksa]

They also omitted ROBERT GINTY,he was in an Academy Award winning film-''Coming Home''and had a 40 year career. In past years they have done a much better job-this was a very unprofessional segment-if they had added a minute to this segment no-one would have minded the show overrunning by 31 minutes-it was very disrespectful.

[john s]

Why can't the major awards programs that do these memorials split the names up so that ALL can be recognized for their contribution? Cooperate!

[Oscar Watcher]

Very disrespectful! It should be all!

[rich]

who was the singer during memorials