The Big Squeeze

When your seating capacity shrinks by half, you can run into a few problems. . .especially if it’s Oscar night.

That’s what’s happened to the producers of this year’s Academy Awards. The March 26 ceremonies moves from the 6,489-seat Shrine Auditorium, where the Oscars were handed out the last two years, to the “cozier” 3,213-seat Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.

It’s such a squeeze that Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences president Karl Malden and the show’s producer, Gil Cates, took out ads in last week’s trade papers urging industry members to see the show from somewhere else. Take advantage of the “lots of great Awards-night parties around town, many of which benefit worthy charities,” they suggested.

Malden and Cates noted that next year the Oscar ceremonies will be back in the “comparatively spacious quarters” of the Shrine.

Since the mid-’60s, when it was first built, the Pavilion served as the home for the Oscars. Only in 1988, when the ticket demand for the 60th anniversary show was so great, were the ceremonies moved. Academy spokesman Bob Werden says the academy’s board voted to stay at the Shrine for the awards show in 1989, but after last year’s show, decided the “more glamorous” Pavilion would be “home” for 1990. Next year, it will be back to the Shrine. Thereafter, the Academy board will have to sign a contract with one of the venues.

In the meantime, this year’s tight seating means that requests for tickets--ranging in price from $50 to $200 apiece--were sent to the 4,500 Academy members on a first-come, first-served basis. There have been cutbacks in the number of tickets given to the press, local and state government officials and the ABC-TV network.

“Of course,” Werden adds, “there’s always room for the nominees and presenters.”