James Cameron, John Williams, Kathleen Kennedy, More Urge Academy to Reverse Controversial Oscars Telecast Changes

variety.com:

Jon Burlingame editorSome of Hollywood’s most high-profile filmmakers, including director James Cameron, producers Kathleen Kennedy and Lili Fini Zanuck and composer John Williams have joined the growing chorus of voices asking the Academy to reverse course and present all 23 Oscars on the live March 27 telecast.In a letter obtained by Variety and sent today to Academy President David Rubin, more than six dozen film professionals including multiple Academy Award winners, contend that the plan to present eight awards during the pre-telecast hour will “demean” these crafts and “relegate [them] to the status of second-class citizens.”The eight are original score, film editing, production design, makeup and hairstyling, sound, documentary short, live-action short and animated short.

The Academy continues to insist that the nominees in those categories will be announced, and the winner’s acceptance speech aired, in edited form and aired as part of the three-hour ABC show.

That’s not good enough for these artists. “To diminish any of those individual categories in the pursuit of ratings and short-term profits does irreparable damage to the Academy’s standing as impartial arbiters, responsible stewards of our industry’s most important awards,” the letter says.“Seeking new audiences by making the telecast more entertaining is a laudable and important goal, but this cannot be achieved by demeaning the very crafts that, in their most outstanding expressions, make the art of filmmaking worthy of celebration.”They urge Rubin and his colleagues on the Academy awards committee “in the strongest possible terms… to reverse your decision.