The sleek gold plated man with a sword who receives endless offerings from the who’s who at Hollywood, the Oscar Trophy is the dream every movie star, every director, every technician wants to hold on to with both hand before an applauding audience at the Kodak Theatre.
In one of the earliest meetings of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences TM in 1927, the subject of the design of the trophy came up. MGM art director Cedric Gibbons solicited designs from several Los Angeles artists, and selected sculptor George Stanley to create the statuette. Stanley's fee reportedly was $500. The statuette resembles a man standing on a film reel, his hands gripping a sword. Since the inception of the Academy Awards in 1929, a total 2,286 Oscars have been handed out.
At first trophy of Oscar was made of solid bronze, then plaster during the metal shortage during World War II, and today, the trophy at Academy Awards is made of gold-plated britannium. The Oscar trophy weighs 8 pounds and is 13 inches tall. Since his first incarnation, the only change to the trophy has been a raise in its pedestal. The trophy’s was earlier known as The Academy Award of Merit, and the origin of the nickname Oscar is somewhat unclear. According to one version, an Academy librarian, Margaret Herrick, remarked that the statuette resembled her Uncle Oscar, and the staff began referring to it as Oscar. Another story says that a Hollywood columnist used the name Oscar in reference to Katharine Hepburn's win in 1934, and the Academy began using the nickname in 1939.
Since 1982, Chicago-based R.S. Owens and Company has been in charge of casting, molding, polishing, and buffing new golden Oscar statuettes every award season. It takes three to four weeks to cast all the fifty statuettes. Since there is always potential for ties in an award, and the honorary awards vary, there is no way to predict the exact number of Oscars that will be needed each year and so surplus Oscars are kept in the Academy's vault until the next year to be on the safe side.
ACADEMY AWARDS®, OSCAR(S)®, OSCAR NIGHTTM and OSCAR® design mark are the trademarks and service marks, and the OSCAR© statuette is copyrighted by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Flights hotels tours, A cheap world tours guide offers information on the Oscar Trophy and the Academy Awards 2008 at Los Angeles, USA .
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