Academy Loosens Rules to Include Movie Ads

One of the long-standing laments about the Academy, or AMPAS, is that they have forbidden movie ads to be run during the Oscars so as not to appear as thoug they are endorsing one film company over another. This report comes from Cynthia Littleton at Variety and was sent to us by FilmBoy Michael:

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences board of governors voted Tuesday night to ease its long-standing ban on movie advertisements running in the Oscar telecast. The board voted to allow a limited number of spots for movies that have not yet opened — meaning that none of the nommed pics can be tubthumped during the telecast.

Acad will allow one spot per distrib, and the spot must also be one that has not yet run anywhere else, an Acad spokeswoman said.

Basically this is the Super Bowl model and it is sure to help bring in some much-needed cash. Hey, no judgments. It’s hard out there for a pimp.