25th Academy Awards - Broadcast

Broadcast

The 25th Academy Awards ceremony was the first to be broadcast on television:

For the first time in history, a television audience estimated at 40,000,000 persons will watch the movie industry's biggest show. It will mark the TV debut for scores of the biggest names in moviedom.

The telecast was prompted by the need to finance the bi-coastal ceremony. When three of the film studios refused to provide their customary financial support, the RCA Victor Division of the Radio Corporation of America agreed to pay AMPAS $100,000 (one source reported $250,000) as a sponsorship fee. NBC telecast the bicoastal ceremony over its 64-station television network and on its 174-station radio system. The Armed Forces Radio Service recorded the proceedings for later broadcast . While in the United States and Canada the show was televised live, in Mexico XHGC-TV had to broadcast a 'Kinephoto' of the ceremony (sponsored there by Kraft Foods and RCA Victor) the following night because no TV network in that country had a station in the U.S.-Mexico border.

The technology used for television at the time meant that Bob Hope had to wear a blue dress shirt with his formal dinner jacket; the traditional white shirt would have been too bright.

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