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Tag: The Academy Museum

  • Oscar Season Lights Up the Academy Museum in Los Angeles

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    Timed to the 98th Academy Awards, the Academy Museum offers a season-long immersion into Hollywood’s biggest night

    As awards season reaches its most cinematic crescendo, the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures transforms into the beating heart of Oscar history and celebration. From now through March 22, the Museum invites Angelenos and visitors alike to experience Oscars Season, a richly layered program that honors the legacy of the Academy Awards while spotlighting the artists and stories shaping this year’s race.

    Timed around the 98th Academy Awards, airing live on Sunday, March 15, the season turns the Museum campus into an immersive destination where film history meets the present moment. Through curated screenings, nominee conversations, gallery activations and special events, the Oscars are not just watched but experienced.

    Throughout the galleries, visitors are immersed in the visual and cultural language of the Oscars. An exclusive Oscars-themed montage takes over the Spielberg Gallery, while the Academy Awards History Gallery debuts a new rotation of iconic red carpet fashion. Legendary looks worn by Elizabeth Taylor, Sharon Stone and Paul Reubens offer a striking reminder that Oscar night has always been as much about cultural impact as cinematic excellence.

    A major highlight arrives on March 1 with the opening of a new gallery titled 19 Branches of the Academy. Developed in collaboration with the Governors of each branch, the exhibition offers a rare behind-the-scenes look at the artists and craftspeople who shape the film industry, from directors and actors to editors, sound designers and visual effects artists. It is a thoughtful exploration of how collective talent and collaboration define cinematic excellence.

    And the Oscar® for Best Picture went to Anora, accepted by Alex Coco, Mikey Madison, Mark Eydelshteyn, Samantha Quan, Sean Baker and Yuriy Borisov during the live ABC Telecast of the 97th Oscars® at the Dolby® Theatre at Ovation Hollywood on Sunday, March 2, 2025.
    Credit: Copyright ©A.M.P.A.S.

    On Sunday afternoons in January and February, the Museum continues its popular Oscar Sundays series with screenings that honor the art of sound. Presented in the David Geffen Theater, films such as It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and Sound of Metal remind audiences that sound is often the invisible force behind cinema’s most unforgettable moments.

    As the Oscars draw closer, the Museum shifts focus to this year’s nominees. From March 7 through March 14, guests can attend screenings of all nominated short films and documentaries, alongside Nominee Spotlights featuring conversations with filmmakers across major categories, including International Feature Film, Best Picture, Makeup and Hairstyling and Animated Feature. Select programs are paired with lobby exhibitions showcasing items from nominated films, offering a tactile connection to the creative process.

    The season culminates on Sunday, March 1,5 with the fifth annual Official Oscars Watch Party. Set against the backdrop of the Museum campus, the event combines live viewing of the ceremony with curated food and wine, photo moments and access to the Museum’s spaces. Creative cocktail attire sets the tone for an evening that celebrates both the glamour and the artistry of Hollywood’s biggest night.

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    Beyond the galleries and theaters, the Oscars spirit extends to the Academy Museum Store with exclusive merchandise and to Fanny’s restaurant, which introduces a cocktail menu inspired by this year’s Best Picture nominees.

    Lewis Pullman and Danielle Brooks host the announcement of the 98th Oscars® nominations on Tuesday, January 22, 2026.
    Credit: Copyright ©A.M.P.A.S.

    More than a celebration, Oscar Season at the Academy Museum reaffirms Los Angeles as the global home of cinema. It is a reminder that the Oscars are not just a single night in March but an evolving story of artists, innovation and cultural memory told year after year from the heart of Hollywood.

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    George Satsidis

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  • Jaws Exhibition Opens at Academy Museum: A Blockbuster Tribute

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    The summer blockbuster film “changed popular culture in ways that are still reverberating today”

    Credit: Photo by Chris Nichols

    When it was released in the summer of 1975, Jaws established the new norm of what a blockbuster movie should be, and fifty years later, it remains a cultural touchstone across generations of moviegoers. Steven Spielberg’s shark-infested classic is the subject of a massive new exhibition newly opened at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures. Jaws: The Exhibition is “The first large-scale exhibition dedicated to a single motion picture,” museum president Amy Homma said at a preview. “Jaws is the summer blockbuster that changed popular culture in ways that are still reverberating today.”

    Credit: Photo by Chris Nichols
    Credit: Photo by Chris Nichols

    While some disaster movies like The Towering Inferno and Earthquake had made waves, the previous year’s crop of films saw family comedies like Benji, Herbie Rides Again and Young Frankenstein topping the charts. Mel Brooks’ Blazing Saddles was the highest-grossing movie of 1974. Jaws was a whole new kind of cinematic experience, only to be topped by Star Wars a couple of years later. Today, studios count on their summer tentpoles to drive much of the year’s business.

    Credit: Photo by Chris Nichols
    Credit: Photo by Chris Nichols

    The star of the new exhibition was already waiting in the wings of the museum. The 25’ fiberglass shark hanging above the entrance, the largest single object in the museum’s collection, was saved from a junkyard and restored in 2021. The extraordinary display of artifacts includes iconic elements from the movie, including sections of the Orca boat, the costumes Richard Dreyfuss, Robert Shaw and Roy Scheider wore and the shark’s dorsal fin with the rig that allowed it to swim into frame, terrifying audiences whenever it appeared onscreen. The big shark, Homma says, has become the “mascot” of the museum.

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    Credit: Photo by Chris Nichols

    Visitors can use a rig to recreate the famous dolly zoom shot of Chief Brody on the beach, learn notes from the iconic John Williams score on the keyboard, and even try their hand at piloting a miniature of the mechanical shark.

    Credit: Photo by Chris Nichols

    The props and costumes in the show, which runs through next July, were sourced from the archives of collectors all over the world who “knew something I didn’t know,” Steven Spielberg said at the museum. “When we shot the opening scene of Chrissie Watkins being taken by the shark, we had a buoy floating in the water. How did anybody know to take the buoy and take it home and sit on it for fifty years? And then loan it to the Academy. How could they know?”

    Credit: Photo by Chris Nichols

    Spielberg recalled the travails of filming on the open water of the Atlantic Ocean with a finicky mechanical shark. “It was a real exercise in hubris and futility. I thought my career was virtually over halfway through production,” the legendary director said. “Everbody was saying to me ‘you are never going to get hired again. This film is way over budget and way over schedule and you are a real liability as a director.’ I thought I’d better give this my all because I’m not working in the industry again after they see the movie. Fortune smiled on us.”

    Credit: Photo by Chris Nichols

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    Chris Nichols

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