Oscars 2014: Show moves to March, setting up an awards season lull

By Rebecca Keegan

March 25, 2013 12 AM PT

The Oscars are going to be a little later next year.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced on Monday the dates for the next two years’ ceremonies — March 2, 2014, and Feb. 22, 2015.

With the shift, the 2014 awards season calendar is shaping up to be an unusual one, with a frenetic January full of guild awards and then a long lull until the Oscar telecast in March. (The show was Feb. 24 this year.)

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On the bright side, the later award date does give voters more time to see all the contending films.

Next February poses some thorny scheduling challenges for awards season planners, mainly the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, taking place Feb. 7-23. Another key live-TV event, the 2014 Super Bowl, is scheduled for Feb. 2.

The Screen Actors Guild Awards, which generally take place the last Sunday in January, have already moved to Saturday, Jan. 18 next year because of the Olympics, and the producers and directors guilds have pushed their show dates to earlier in January as well.

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The Writers Guild of America and the Hollywood Foreign Press Assn., which produces the Golden Globes, have not yet announced their 2014 dates.

Except during Winter Olympics years, the academy has aired its annual Oscar telecast in February since 2002 to combat award-show fatigue and help TV ratings.

The 2015 telecast, taking place in mid-February, will be a return to that strategy.

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