A household name but with no one watching, are the Academy Awards… over? In 1998, the Oscars drew 55 million viewers to their self-professed glamorous ceremony. In 2010, numbers hovered above 40 million. Each year since, they have plummeted: 23.6 million in 2020 to 9.8 million in 2021. So why does no one watch the Oscars anymore?
In a recent hit piece, the Cut described a current vibe shift, in that “sometimes things change, and a once-dominant social wavelength starts to feel dated.” Caught in this swing, the Oscars hang between their once high-brow status and kitsch tele, skimming our radar.