By Oluwatosin Maliki
Late-night TV show host, Jimmy Kimmel has been tapped to host the 96th Academy Awards, marking his fourth time helming the prestigious ceremony.
The organizers of the event disclosed this on Wednesday, stating that Kimmel will preside over Hollywood’s biggest awards show for the second consecutive year, after television ratings significantly increased at last year’s well-reviewed ceremony.
In a statement issued by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and broadcaster ABC, Kimmel joked, “I always dreamed of hosting the Oscars exactly four times”.
According to Oscars executive producers Raj Kapoor and Katy Mullan, they hailed Kimmel as “one of the all-time great Oscars hosts,” praising his “perfect blend of humanity and humour.”
The 96th Oscars will be held on March 10th, 2024 at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood.
The TV host had previously hosted the show in 2017, a ceremony that ended with the infamous mix-up that saw “La La Land” accidentally named best picture, and 2018.
Eventually, he was brought back for the 2023 edition. Kimmel was widely viewed as a safe pair of hands, much needed after the previous year’s ceremony which ended in shock, as Will Smith slapped Chris Rock on stage for cracking a joke about his wife.
The March ceremony took off with Kimmel being lowered onto the stage as two US Navy jets flew over the theater, during the show Kimmel was accompanied to the podium by a miniature emotional support donkey.
Quest Times gathered that the Oscars television ratings increased for the second year in a row, as 18.7 million viewers tuned in to watch hit sci-fi flick “Everything Everywhere All at Once” dominate the proceedings.
The upward trend is a welcome shot in the arm for live awards shows, which have been shedding viewers more broadly as they compete for eyeballs with streamers and social media highlight clips, according to AFP.
Hollywood faced a big challenge, this year, as it scrambles to recover from the first dual strikes embarked on by actors and writers in 60 years, which nearly brought the industry to a standstill for months.