Our very good friend @NeverTooEarlyMP who runs the site NeverTooEarlyMoviePredictions has for many years undertaken the monumental task of researching, verifying and listing the names of as many Academy members as have ever been collected under one roof, anywhere at anytime. A few weeks ago we asked if he could put together a guest post to help us visualize the relative sizes of the branches of the AMPAS, so we could get a better sense of who’s in charge of deciding the outcome of our annual obsession. The explanation and illustrations were delivered to us straight away, but we held off posting during the nominations process because we don’t like to rock the boat when so many coin-flips could tip the boat one way or the other. Well, after yesterday’s somewhat stunning announcement by the Academy’s Board of Governors, that boat has officially been rocked way beyond any turbulence we could ever cause.
This detailed information now takes on greater importance, because it can serve as a baseline when we compare the new numbers a year from now — and that way we’ll be able to measure exactly how much effect the promised changes have had on Oscar’s balance of power. We hope this is more information than you probably ever thought possible there was to know about the makeup and breakdown of the Academy’s membership. – Ryan
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Who Gets an Oscar Ballot? by @NeverTooEarlyMP
It’s not unusual for actors and directors to become household names. But how long would it take you to compile a list of your 437 favorite sound editors? Or 359 of your favorite visual effects artists? How many stunt coordinators could you actually name if your life depended on it?
In a year when many fans were hoping that Star Wars and Mad Max would both break into the best picture race, it may be time to raise our consciousness about who actually makes our movie magic happen. For every actor you recognize on the screen, there are many more people working behind the scenes, behind the camera, at a studio workshop across town, or in an office building across the country. If we want the Academy to take blockbusters, animation or big budget films more seriously, then we might start by learning more about the artists, animators and financiers who make these films possible.
Over at The Wrap, Steve Pond posted the annual branch count prepared by the Academy for Oscar voting, and the grassroots researchers at The Academy Members Project have gone a step further and identified over 77% of them by name. As of December 14, 2015 there were 7,152 Academy members (a number that has already dropped by about ten due to deaths in the past month):
Some news organizations assume that the general public is only interested in members who can vote for the Oscars, and so they leave out any mention of the Retired and Associate members (who don’t get to vote). This is why you will likely ordinarily see it reported that there are 6,261 voting members this year from the 17 branches and the At-Large members:
Actors make up the largest single branch, but they are nowhere near being the majority. At 18% of voters (a percentage that’s actually been shrinking relative to the other branches in recent years), their numbers look far greater on the red carpet than at the actual ballot box. For those moviegoers who are already accustomed to associating films primarily with their actors, it is perhaps too easy to lose sight of the potential impact of all those smaller branches that make up the rest of the pie. Under the current rules, it only takes 5% of the ballots to earn a best picture nomination. That means that theoretically the visual effects, sound and animation branches could have secured nominations for Mad Max, Star Wars and Inside Out without garnering a single vote from an actor!
To help remind myself of the untapped power of these other branches, I have begun imagining the branches in clusters. It’s not a perfect system, but the chart below reminds me to think about the Academy in different ways. For example, when I combine the producers, executives and public relations branches, they collectively make up a larger voting bloc than the actors do — lest I forget that the movie industry is as much about business as it is about the personalities you see on the screen. Similarly, while the technical and craft artists may be broken up into different branches, they constitute a greater proportion of the Academy than the famous directors that get casually labeled as auteurs. And while documentarians, animators and musicians may not have that much in common, it would be foolish to completely disregard the number of Oscar votes that come from the top left quarter of this chart:
The numbers for each branch at the beginning of the 2015-216 awards season are as follows:
- Actors Branch: 1138 Members.
- Casting Directors Branch: 86 Members
- Cinematographers Branch: 227 Members.
- Costume Designers Branch: 115 Members.
- Designers Branch: 278 Members. Includes art directors, production designers and set decorators.
- Directors Branch: 394 Members.
- Documentary Branch: 237 Members.
- Executives Branch: 458 Members.
- Film Editors Branch: 254 Members.
- Makeup Artists And Hairstylists Branch: 141 Members.
- Music Branch: 257 Members.
- Producers Branch: 483 Members.
- Public Relations Branch: 388 Members.
- Short Films And Feature Animation Branch: 401 Members.
- Sound Branch: 437 Members.
- Visual Effects Branch: 359 Members.
- Writers Branch: 392 Members.
- At Large Members: 216 Members. Includes stunt coordinators and production managers and other fields that don’t have their own branch..
- Associate Members: 175 Members. Includes talent agents and those who have contributed to the movie industry or the Academy in ways that don’t fit into the branches above. (Note that these members do not vote on the Oscars)
- Retired Members: 716 Members. (Note that these members do not vote on the Oscars)
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That’s my understanding. If there was a process for appealing to move back to active, I’ve never heard of it.
Note that I’m talking about the retired status that’s been around for several decades, and that was a voluntary thing. (Although I’ve heard that some people may have been “pressured into it”). The whole idea at the time was that it was intended for people who wanted to keep the honor of being a member, but had chosen that they didn’t want to vote anymore.
The new, enforced rules for what Cheryl’s statement calls “Emeritus Status” sound like they might be a little different in this one sense: She says in the FAQ that the 3 decades of employment do NOT necessarily have to be consecutive. Which seems to open up the possibility that someone could go into Emeritus status, begin working again, and then be reinstated to full membership based on that new work. But we’ll have to wait and see if that actually happens in practice.
Whoa.. So once one has retired status, they cannot be undone..?
Thanks again Elton! I finally got these all up on the site.
The two Ultimo Segundo articles mentioned Bruno Barreto, but my translator app couldn’t quite handle the sentences about him for some reason. In context, do those look like confirmations for him as well?
By the way, I do a monthly email newsletter for people who are interested in helping with the search. If you’d like to join that, just let me know your email and I’d be happy to add you. (You can find my contact info on the site so you don’t have to post it here for the whole world to see).
LOL! I love the idea of a whole branch for fat people! Especially since the actors branch is nothing but a bunch of pretty people. (I’m looking at you Christopher Walken and Steve Buscemi!)
Interesting enough, the “Members at Large” is where they put all the stunt coordinators, some of whom are probably in pretty good shape!
Too funny. I agree that their existence is important and worthy from a commercial standpoint. But I cannot wrap my head around a group of advertisers who get to vote for the Oscar. I also feel that all the fat people in the Members at Large branch should be kicked out too. Come to think of it, how come fat people have their own branch?
I had the same thought. AMPAS can assure all they want, but some cash-strapped stuidio is going to figure out how the math is done (or more likely, have officials on several of these executive committees who will know for sure.)
But I suppose an individual DVD doesn’t really cost that much these days. And I think some of the studios may already be sending them to retired and associate members already.
Who voted high! lol Now we know. It’s all people like Ryan’s fault!
I assume the push for new members will limit the loss? I’m not sure distributors will be happy about forking out for screeners for non-voters, though. AMPAS has assured people that everyone will still get them.
I doubt most of the academy’s artists would be able to do what they do without a little snake oil. Art doesn’t pay for itself, especially art that can get as expensive as some of these movie budgets. And there’s no way that a bunch of starving artist filmmakers would be able to pass gold statues around to themselves.
But I have wondered sometimes if it would be more honest to call themselves AMPABS (The academy of motion picture arts, businesses and sciences), or AMPBAS (the academy of motion picture businesses, arts and sciences)
Ha! I hadn’t heard that story before. LOVE IT!
It really does call into question some of the twitter outrage that goes on this time of year though. All the stats are (or were) counting the “academy member” as a 70-80 year old guy, when the actual “Oscar voter” was a 19-year old version of our own Ryan Adams!
Fantastic! Thanks Elton! I’ll add these to my list tonight!
I guess that’s one thing some people will love him for.. lol
It’s time for my soap box again.
Do away with the snake oil salesmen (the Public Relations Branch consisting of 388 members according to the above) altogether. Academy of Motion Picture ARTS and SCIENCES. It’s not the Academy of Motion Picture SELLING and PROMOTION. These people who hand out questionnaires at screenings and try to sell movies have nothing to do with creating and producing a movie. It just irks me that these people get to vote alongside Martin Scorsese, Sandy Powell, Roger Deakins, Rick Baker, Aaron Sorkin, David Fincher, David O. Russell, Ennio Morricone, Thomas Newman et al., et al., et al., et al. CREATIVE and SCIENTIFIC artists who break their backs and pour their hearts and souls into making movies.
But, oh nooooooo. AMPAS has 388 people who get a vote who have nothing to do with making a movie. They’re only function is to promote and sell a movie, which is a throw-back to the old Hollywood system. And they don’t belong in AMPAS. Case in point? They don’t have an award for Best Public Relations Salesmen, do they? Just consider that the PR Branch is LARGER than the scientific branch of visual effects artists. That should put it in better perspective for you.
Thanks for letting me get this off my chest. Let me summarize, however. How the flying fuck do these snake oil salesmen get to vote for the Academy Awards? And for all of AMPAS thumping their chests about being representative of the best people making movies, that’s a crock because the public relations branch does not consist of anyone who is MAKING movies. They consist of people who are only SELLING movies. A totally different animal.
Oh, jesus! Honestly, people don’t even realize how ironic this “#OscarsSoWhite” bullshit. Do you even realize that it’s racist toward white people? So, white people performed better this year.. SO FUCKING WHAT?! Fucking deal with it instead of acting like a cry-baby. 2 years ago, a movie that I don’t even considerate so great talked about slavery and won best picture. Even though I didn’t enjoy the movie so much, I had no problem with it winning. And what was the subject? Black oppression! Yeah, sure, the academy gives a questionably deserving award just because the subject of the movie can speak to all kinds of audiences, everything is fine. But boo-fucking-hoo, black people don’t performe well enough to get oscar nominations, now it’s a tragedy! So, someone should automatically be an oscar contender because of the color of his/her skin. Sorry, no. I’m not racist, but I honestly hate when people complain that they’re oppressed because of such retarded “reasons”. Sorry for bad English, but I had a lot to say.
Hey, guys.
I found some links here:
http://ultimosegundo.ig.com.br/oscar/para+brasileiros+que+votam+no+oscar+premiacao+reflete+rumos+da+industria/n1237947652264.html
http://cultura.estadao.com.br/blogs/direto-da-fonte/o-oscar-segundo-babenco/
http://ultimosegundo.ig.com.br/oscar/so+um+brasileiro+admite+votar+no+oscar+2011/n1238115101729.html
http://paradadecinema.com.br/entendendo-o-oscar-quem-sao-os-membros-da-academia/http://paradadecinema.com.br/entendendo-o-oscar-quem-sao-os-membros-da-academia/
http://www1.folha.uol.com.br/fsp/1996/3/25/ilustrada/5.html
I’ll keep searching. If I find anything else, I’ll post here!
Elton, i would love to see this if its not too hard to find.
I’ve told this story 5 or 6 times over the years, so my apologies to everyone who’s had to endure it more than once.
I spent two spring/summers in LA when I was 19 and 20. I went to LA with the idea of getting a job with a studio, but all I really did was party nonstop.
But I did meet people. There are lots of gay people with studio jobs in LA and I was never shy. Plus, you know, being 19 never hurts.
So just by crazy luck I ended up sharing a half a duplex house with a guy named Tom Guido who was Freddie Fields’ personal assistant for years.
Who’s Freddie Fields? Oh, just the President and CEO of MGM right up till the time Sony bought up the old MGM lot at Culver City. Sony let Freddie Fields keep his office in the Thalberg Bldg, years after MGM was no longer a production entity. I was in and out of the Thalberg Bldg dozens and dozens of times that spring and summer.
And what happened one spring? Just days after I arrived in LA for my 2nd year out there? My housemate Tom Guido brought home Freddie’s Oscar ballot.
Freddie Fields did not give a damn about his Oscar ballot. He couldn’t care less about it. He gave it to Tommy every year.
We sat around passing around a bong and filled out the Oscar ballot — I was so baked that I have no idea what we voted for or even what was nominated. I think we took it seriously. We probably tried to make good picks… but honestly, I cannot tell you what we voted for. Too stoned.
Not a story to be proud of, I know.
I do remember this: wow, that ballot was a pretty thing. It was a foldout card, like nearly a full yard wide (1 meter wide) when it was fully open. It folded like an accordion… every fold was a different category. Printed on paper so classy that it felt like stiff white cloth.
Tommy wasn’t even that impressed to have a ballot to bring home with him. He’d been filling out Freddie Fields’ Oscar ballots for years. It was no big deal to him. Tommy mainly just liked to show it off to impress boys. Boys like me.
so… I really doubt that the President of MGM is the only Academy member who ever handed his Oscar ballot to somebody on his staff… (er, yes, “on his staff” …pun intended.)
Sasha could definitely answer this better than I can, but my sense is that pundits & predictors watch the film editing noms & guilds because they have had a good predictive track record in the past.
Sometimes that gets written as a causal thing (“you need the support of the editors”), when the actual number of voters would mean that at best it’s a correlation.
The editors may be looking for similar things in their branch nominees as the academy as a whole looks for in best picture, but my sense is that’s a happy coincidence that helps us predict what will happen (and almost always turns out to predict them correctly!), not necessarily that they’re providing the deciding votes that put something over the top.
Quincy, Sindey, Denzel, Oprah and Will definitely are members. We’re not sure about Ice Cube — although that quote suggests that maybe he’s not. I’ve also been watching all of Jada’s comments very closely and so far haven’t found her actually saying whether or not she’s a member (usually choosing to referring to the “Hollywood community” or the “industry” instead).
But of course, money from all types of sources depends upon the academy being seen as relevant, so the changes to diversify in recruitment would need to come regardless of these particular donors. I’m not sure whether the kicking people out thing necessarily would have been needed for that though.
This does have to be a concern, not only for the yearly dues, but also for all the fundraising campaigns that they have for their museum, library, etc. I hope it’s not too morbid to note that some of the older members might have the academy in their wills. Making them angry this close to their deaths really could cost the academy a pretty penny. Unless, of course, they manage to find loopholes for all of the ones who are really rich. (Which they probably will).
Very interesting. When you look at it from a “bundled” context it makes sense why those guilds are important – the “like minded” groups will most likely vote similarly. However, I’m still confused as to why so much weight is given to the Film Editing branch which alone is 4% of the voting body – in line with the most of the other members of the Visual Crafts segment. Sasha, can you explain the significance of film editing? It’s always been something I wondered about 🙂
Portuguese is great! We’ve got citations on the site from some of our international researchers that link to several languages already (Spanish, French, Italian, Russian, Chinese). And I’ve got a translation app on my computer that lets me read them fairly well.
Luckily, I think we’re about to get a scientific test to find out just how often this happens. With the new “emeritus” rule going into effect, we should be watching to see if the Hollywood divorce rate rises, and how many court documents include the words “I only stayed with the rat bastard for his Oscar vote!”
As someone who has worked in the industry for 3 decades +, I can say that the stories are both true AND vastly overstated.
Thanks a lot for your answers! 🙂
I remember reading this infos on some articles from Brazilian journalists. I’ll search for it, if you don’t mind it being written in Portuguese.
I can’t prove it, but this has always felt like one of those urban legend claims to me. Or at least, one of those cases where the STORIES about this happening must be much more common than the actual examples of this happening.
But presuming I’m wrong and this type of thing really is as rampant as the stories claim: Shouldn’t that soften the outcry about there being too many men in the academy, if tons of their wives are actually doing the voting instead? Wouldn’t that mean that the average age of a real “Oscar voter” is 20 years younger than we’ve been told, since all their kids are actually casting the ballot?
I believe those membership rules are bogus and will only cheapen Academy
membership. What they should do instead to make sure the oscar lineup includes
diversity is change nomination rules, so that in each category at least 1
of the nominees represents diversity (2 for BP). All those categories
that do not include at least 1 diversity nominee will have to add 1 spot
to the most voted for diversity candidate so that nobody gets bumped who
would’ve been nominated with current rules. That means most categories
would end up with either 5 or 6 nominees and BP could have anywhere
from 5 to 12.
Lest we forget, a number of voting members simply pass their voting cards to their children or spouses to fill, which likely skews a few categories in unpredictable ways
Update: I found a quote from Variety that they were $250 back in 2004. I’m not sure how much they’ve gone up since then.
I haven’t been able to find a number for the current years dues. I’ve found historical numbers that placed it at $100, and I know that it was $200 per year a few years ago. But I can’t say for sure how much it is now.
Do we know how much each member needs to pay in dues every year?
Great questions!
The ability to vote definitely requires paying the annual dues in order to remain an “active” member. But for several decades they’ve had a category for “retired members” (see the first chart above – the yellow part of the smaller circle on the right, which is 716 people). It’s basically a voluntary version of the Emeritus status that the Academy announced last week, which allows you to remain an academy member, but give up all your voting rights.
So it’s possible that Merielles and Mantovani have voluntarily moved themselves to retired status, which would mean that they’re still members, but will never again have the opportunity to vote. (Note that “retired status” doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with retiring from making films. It just means retiring from being an active member/voter).
We’ve also found some members who say they still continue to pay their fees but don’t vote (or don’t vote every year). It sounds like Babenco and maybe Montetenegro fall into this category. As long as they keep paying, they’re still eligible to vote any year that they want to, regardless of how many elections they skipped.
I think the Academy has occasionally released percentages of how many eligible voters actually voted in some years. (I’ll look and see if I can find those for you). However, I do remember that they said that the numbers increased when they switched to online voting, which makes sense because it’s much easier for international members than having to use the postal system!
P.S. If you happen to remember where you read the info on the members above, I’d love to have the sources!
NeverTooEarlyMP, I have some questions you might be able to kindly answer.
Fernando Meirelles (director nominee, “City of God”) was invited (and has accepted) to join the Academy and says he only has voted once (the year after his admission). He later gave up voting because, he says, 1) he doesn’t like this system where only films with heavy market campaigns have a shot, 2) He doesn’t have time to watch the films in contention 3) He wasn’t keen to pay the annual fees. Braulio Mantovani (City of God writer) is the same. – Do you know if a member stops paying the Academy’s fees, he loses his membership or only his voting rights?
Fernanda Montenegro (actress nominated for “Central Station”) also says she has zero interest on voting. But, she’s still a member. Hector Babenco says he sometimes votes, sometimes not. I think Daniel Rezende (editor’s branch) is the only Brazilian who uses his membership and voting opportunity every year. Since most films only premiere in Brazil by January, he watches mostly screeners – How hard it is to know how much members actually vote and how it oscillates year by year? Almost impossible?
No. That’s just the number that we’ve been able to identify by name. Which leaves the rest who we still aren’t sure who they are.
In addition to wanting more diversity, I remember reading that Michael Moore was one of the governors at the time who was fighting to expand the membership. The documentary branch was one of the smallest branches at the time, and so the proportion of new members they could add had left out A LOT of prominent documentarians over the years.
I just found the old rules that went into place in 2004 (now no longer in effect). The total new members for the years after that allowed each branch to: fill vacancies that resulted from death or the move to retired status (what we’re now calling Emeritus status), plus allowed 30 new members for the entire academy, which were divided among the branches proportionally according to their current size.
On top of that, the board of governors and executive committees were so focused on keeping the academy small during that time that many branches didn’t even invite the full number that they were allowed to under those rules. There were a few years where the number of academy members actually shrunk from the year before!
You’re right Ryan. If we look at the history far enough out, we see that they start to go in cycles. They go through periods where they want to revitalize the membership and let in lots of new people, and then they start to worry that they’ve lowered their standards and go through a period where they tighten up.
Around 2004 they entered another one of their “tight” periods — only allowing each branch to add new members ONLY to replace ones that had died, plus a small number of new ones (I forget if it was 2 or 5 additional per branch). They actually wrote it that way into their bylaws for that decade or so. It kept the number of Oscar voters relatively constant for a decade, but I suspect that’s part of why they look so behind right now. Obviously, they’ve entered a new growth period again for the next several years.
Interestingly, the memorial segment of the show is a creature unto itself – both excluding people who were members and including people who weren’t. It’s definitely fame based with a small sampling of representatives from different fields to appease each branch thrown into the mix. And even with that, they still always end up messing it up!
As of December 14, 2015 there were 7,152 Academy members (a number that has already dropped by about ten due to deaths in the past month):
I hope I’m not being too morbid or insensitive to say so, but this is interesting. (Interesting and sad).
If 10 members a month pass away, we can estimate as many as 120-150 filmmakers depart the Academy every year.
Used to be around 180-200 new invitees every year, but recently that number seems to have increased to 250-300.
That’s at least 5% attrition and new blood that is already changing the Academy annually.
For all our grousing, change has been underway for years — the changes can’t not come.
We used to say that sci-fi never stood a chance at the Oscars (There was 2001: A Space Odyssey and… that’s about it.) But that hangup is certainly no longer an obstacle.
RIP all the dozens of Oscar voters who are not famous enough to be mentioned during the In Memorium tribute every year.
The public relations branch gets a lot of people scratching their heads. But when you start to look at who they are and the roles they play, it makes a bit more sense, especially when we remember that the film industry is a business, after all. All the hype that we hear about new films, the “leaked” stories about what films are coming out. The posters and trailers that build anticipation. The merchandising for the big blockbusters. Even planning the awards chatter and campaigning that AD writes about; and things like when, where and how to distribute a film. All of these decisions are part of what the public relations folks do.
And if that’s not enough, it’s actually the public relations branch that is a large part of why people care about the Oscars at all. It didn’t just start out being “Hollywood’s Biggest Night.” Decades of getting the name out there went into it. (At one point the awards booklets had the public relations folks as one of the key committees that was always published in the program). Every ritual that we associate with the Oscars – from the choice to televise the awards, to the red carpet, to nomination morning – was partially the brainchild of one of the folks in the public relations branch!
It’s too early to know for sure, but it very well may end up hurting some. It’s been hard enough for women and people of color to break into the business enough to even get an invitation. But now only the ones who were able to fight those racist and sexist systems and stay active for 30 years will be allowed to stay. We’ve already heard from one costume designer (Jane Ruhm) who isn’t certain how the rule will impact her.
I’ve never understood that Public Relations branch.
I enjoy looking at stats like this!
I’m wondering if the new rules will adversely affect women and people of color, since they have a harder time finding employment in the long run?
Thanks for doing all this work! Really interesting.
Thank you Sasha and Ryan for the opportunity to write for you! As you know I’m a huge fan of this site!