72nd Academy Awards

The 72nd Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), honored films released in 1999 and took place on March 26, 2000, at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, beginning at 5:30 p.m. PST / 8:30 p.m. EST. During the ceremony, the AMPAS presented Academy Awards (commonly referred to as Oscars) in 23 categories. The ceremony, televised in the United States by ABC, was produced by husband-and-wife producing team Richard and Lili Fini Zanuck and was directed by Louis J. Horvitz. Actor Billy Crystal hosted the show for the seventh time. He first presided over the 62nd ceremony held in 1990 and had last hosted the 70th ceremony held in 1998. Three weeks earlier in a ceremony at the Regent Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, California held on March 4, the Academy Awards for Technical Achievement were presented by host Salma Hayek.

American Beauty won five awards, including Best Picture. Other winners included The Matrix with four awards, The Cider House Rules and Topsy-Turvy with two, and All About My Mother, Boys Don't Cry, Girl, Interrupted, King Gimp, My Mother Dreams the Satan's Disciples in New York, The Old Man and the Sea, One Day in September, The Red Violin, Sleepy Hollow, and Tarzan with one. The telecast garnered almost 47 million viewers in the United States.

Winners and nominees

The nominees for the 72nd Academy Awards were announced on February 15, 2000, at 5:38 a.m. PST (13:38 UTC) at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills, California, by Robert Rehme, president of the academy, and the actor Dustin Hoffman. American Beauty received the most nominations with eight total; The Cider House Rules and The Insider tied for second with seven nominations each.

The winners were announced during the awards ceremony on March 26, 2000. Sam Mendes was the sixth person to win Best Director for his directorial debut. Best Actor winner Kevin Spacey became the tenth performer to win acting Oscars in both lead and supporting categories. By virtue of her father Jon Voight's Best Lead Actor win for 1978's Coming Home, Best Supporting Actress winner Angelina Jolie and Voight became the second father-daughter Oscar acting winners.

Awards

Winners are listed first, highlighted in boldface, and indicated with a double dagger ().

{| class=wikitable role="presentation"

| valign="top" width="50%" |

American Beauty – Bruce Cohen and Dan Jinks, producers
The Cider House Rules – Richard N. Gladstein, producer
The Green Mile – Frank Darabont and David Valdes, producers
The Insider – Pieter Jan Brugge and Michael Mann, producers
The Sixth Sense – Frank Marshall, Kathleen Kennedy, and Barry Mendel, producers

| valign="top" |

Sam Mendes – American Beauty
Lasse Hallström – The Cider House Rules
Spike Jonze – Being John Malkovich
Michael Mann – The Insider
M. Night Shyamalan – The Sixth Sense

| valign="top" |

Kevin Spacey – American Beauty as Lester Burnham
Russell Crowe – The Insider as Jeffrey Wigand
Richard Farnsworth – The Straight Story as Alvin Straight
Sean Penn – Sweet and Lowdown as Emmet Ray
Denzel Washington – The Hurricane as Rubin Carter

| valign="top" |

Hilary Swank – Boys Don't Cry as Brandon Teena
Annette Bening – American Beauty as Carolyn Burnham
Janet McTeer – Tumbleweeds as Mary Jo Walker
Julianne Moore – The End of the Affair as Sarah Miles
Meryl Streep – Music of the Heart as Roberta Guaspari

| valign="top" |

Michael Caine – The Cider House Rules as Dr. Wilbur Larch
Tom Cruise – Magnolia as Frank T.J. Mackey
Michael Clarke Duncan – The Green Mile as John Coffey
Jude Law – The Talented Mr. Ripley as Dickie Greenleaf
Haley Joel Osment – The Sixth Sense as Cole Sear

| valign="top" |

Angelina Jolie – Girl, Interrupted as Lisa Rowe
Toni Collette – The Sixth Sense as Lynn Sear
Catherine Keener – Being John Malkovich as Maxine Lund
Samantha Morton – Sweet and Lowdown as Hattie
Chloë Sevigny – Boys Don't Cry as Lana Tisdel

| valign="top" |

American Beauty – Alan Ball
Being John Malkovich – Charlie Kaufman
Magnolia – Paul Thomas Anderson
The Sixth Sense – M. Night Shyamalan
Topsy-Turvy – Mike Leigh

| valign="top" |

The Cider House Rules – John Irving based on his novel
Election – Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor from the novel by Tom Perrotta
The Green Mile – Frank Darabont adapted from the novel by Stephen King
The Insider – Eric Roth and Michael Mann based on the Vanity Fair article "The Man Who Knew Too Much" by Marie Brenner
The Talented Mr. Ripley – Anthony Minghella adapted from the novel by Patricia Highsmith

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All About My Mother (Spain) in Spanish – Pedro Almodóvar
East/West (France) in French – Régis Wargnier
Himalaya: Caravan (Nepal) in Nepalese – Éric Valli
Solomon & Gaenor (United Kingdom) in Welsh – Paul Morrison
Under the Sun (Sweden) in Swedish – Colin Nutley

| valign="top" |

One Day in September – Arthur Cohn and Kevin Macdonald
Buena Vista Social Club – Wim Wenders and Ulrich Felsberg
Genghis Blues – Roko Belic and Adrian Belic
On the Ropes – Nanette Burstein and Brett Morgen
Speaking in Strings – Paola di Florio and Lilibet Foster

| valign="top" |

King Gimp – Susan Hannah Hadary and William A. Whiteford
Eyewitness – Bert Van Bork
The Wildest Show in the South: The Angola Prison Rodeo – Simeon Soffer and Jonathan Stack

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My Mother Dreams the Satan's Disciples in New York – Barbara Schock and Tammy Tiehel
Bror, Min Bror – Henrik Ruben Genz and Michael W. Horsten
Killing Joe – Mehdi Norowzian and Steve Wax
Kleingeld – Marc-Andreas Bochert and Gabriele Lins
Major and Minor Miracles – Marcus Olsson

| valign="top" |

The Old Man and the Sea – Alexander Petrov
3 Misses – Paul Driessen
Humdrum – Peter Peake
My Grandmother Ironed the King's Shirts – Torill Kove
When the Day Breaks – Wendy Tilby and Amanda Forbis

| valign="top" |

The Red Violin – John Corigliano
American Beauty – Thomas Newman
Angela's Ashes – John Williams
The Cider House Rules – Rachel Portman
The Talented Mr. Ripley – Gabriel Yared

| valign="top" |

"You'll Be in My Heart" from Tarzan – Music and Lyrics by Phil Collins
"Blame Canada" from South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut – Music and Lyrics by Trey Parker and Marc Shaiman
"Music of My Heart" from Music of the Heart – Music and Lyrics by Diane Warren
"Save Me" from Magnolia – Music and Lyrics by Aimee Mann
"When She Loved Me" from Toy Story 2 – Music and Lyrics by Randy Newman

| valign="top" |

The Matrix – John T. Reitz, Gregg Rudloff, David E. Campbell and David Lee
The Green Mile – Robert J. Litt, Elliot Tyson, Michael Herbick and Willie D. Burton
The Insider – Andy Nelson, Doug Hemphill and Lee Orloff
The Mummy – Leslie Shatz, Chris Carpenter, Rick Kline and Chris Munro
Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace – Gary Rydstrom, Tom Johnson, Shawn Murphy and John Midgley

| valign="top" |

The Matrix – Dane Davis
Fight Club – Ren Klyce and Richard Hymns
Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace – Ben Burtt and Tom Bellfort

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Sleepy Hollow – Art Direction: Rick Heinrichs; Set Decoration: Peter Young
Anna and the King – Art Direction: Luciana Arrighi; Set Decoration: Ian Whittaker
The Cider House Rules – Art Direction: David Gropman; Set Decoration: Beth Rubino
The Talented Mr. Ripley – Art Direction: Roy Walker; Set Decoration: Bruno Cesari
Topsy-Turvy – Art Direction: Eve Stewart; Set Decoration: Eve Stewart and John Bush

| valign="top" |

American Beauty – Conrad Hall
The End of the Affair – Roger Pratt
The Insider – Dante Spinotti
Sleepy Hollow – Emmanuel Lubezki
Snow Falling on Cedars – Robert Richardson

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Topsy-Turvy – Christine Blundell and Trefor Proud
Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me – Michèle Burke and Mike Smithson
Bicentennial Man – Greg Cannom
Life – Rick Baker

| valign="top" |

Topsy-Turvy – Lindy Hemming
Anna and the King – Jenny Beavan
Sleepy Hollow – Colleen Atwood
The Talented Mr. Ripley – Ann Roth and Gary Jones
Titus – Milena Canonero

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The Matrix – Zach Staenberg
American Beauty – Tariq Anwar and Christopher Greenbury
The Cider House Rules – Lisa Zeno Churgin
The Insider – William Goldenberg, Paul Rubell and David Rosenbloom
The Sixth Sense – Andrew Mondshein

| colspan="2" valign="top" width="50%"|

The Matrix – John Gaeta, Janek Sirrs, Steve Courtley and Jon Thum
Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace – John Knoll, Dennis Muren, Scott Squires and Rob Coleman
Stuart Little – John Dykstra, Jerome Chen, Henry F. Anderson III and Eric Allard

Honorary Award

To Andrzej Wajda in recognition of five decades of extraordinary film direction.

Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award

Warren Beatty

Films with multiple nominations and awards

The following 17 films received multiple nominations:

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align: center;"

! scope="col" width="55" | Nominations

! scope="col" align="center" | Film

| style="text-align: center;" | 8

| American Beauty

| rowspan=2 style="text-align:center" | 7

| The Cider House Rules

| The Insider

| style="text-align: center;" | 6

| The Sixth Sense

| style="text-align: center;" | 5

| The Talented Mr. Ripley

|rowspan=3 style="text-align:center" | 4

| The Green Mile

| The Matrix

| Topsy-Turvy

|rowspan=4 style="text-align:center" | 3

| Being John Malkovich

|Magnolia

|Sleepy Hollow

| Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace

|rowspan=5 style="text-align:center" | 2

| Anna and the King

| Boys Don't Cry

| The End of the Affair

| Music of the Heart

| Sweet and Lowdown

The following four films received multiple awards:

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align: center;"

! scope="col" width="55" | Awards

! scope="col" align="center" | Film

| style="text-align: center;" | 5

| American Beauty

| style="text-align: center;" | 4

| The Matrix

|rowspan=2 style="text-align:center" | 2

| The Cider House Rules

| Topsy-Turvy

Presenters and performers

The following individuals presented awards or performed musical numbers.

Presenters (in order of appearance)

{| class="wikitable sortable"

! Name(s) !! Role

| || Announcer for the 72nd annual Academy Awards

| (AMPAS president) || Gave opening remarks welcoming guests to the awards ceremony

| Cameron Diaz Lucy Liu || Presenters of the award for Best Costume Design

| || Presenter of the child actors tribute montage

| Mike Myers|| Presenters of the award for Best Sound

| Tobey Maguire|| Presenters of the award for Best Makeup

| || Presenter of the film The Cider House Rules on the Best Picture segment

| || Presenter of the award for Best Supporting Actress

| || Presenter of the "200 Million Year History" movie segment

| Jude Law|| Presenters of the award for Best Live Action Short Film

| Buzz Lightyear Jessie Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots || Presentation of the award for Best Animated Short Film

| || Presenter of the film The Green Mile on the Best Picture segment

| Vanessa Williams|| Introducers of the performances of the Best Original Song nominees

| || Presenter of the award for Best Original Song

| Thora Birch Mena Suvari|| Presenters of the award Best Documentary Short Subject

| Uma Thurman|| Presenters of the award for Best Documentary Feature

| || Presenter of the award for Best Supporting Actor

| || Presenter of the Honorary Academy Award to Andrzej Wajda

| || Presenter of the award Best Sound Effects Editing

| || Presenter of the segment of the Academy Awards for Technical Achievement and the Gordon E. Sawyer Award

| || Presenter of the award for Best Visual Effects

| || Presenter of the film American Beauty on the Best Picture segment

| || Presenter of the film The Sixth Sense on Best Picture segment

| Penélope Cruz|| Presenters of the award for Best Foreign Language Film

| Charlize Theron|| Presenters of the award for Best Original Score

| || Presenter of the In Memoriam tribute

| Julianne Moore|| Presenters of the award for Best Art Direction

| Ashley Judd|| Presenters of the award for Best Film Editing

| || Presenter of the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award to Warren Beatty

| || Presenter for the award for Best Cinematography

| || Presenter of the award for Best Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published

| || Presenter of the award for Best Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen/Original Screenplay

| || Presenter of the film The Insider on the Best Picture segment

| || Presenter of the award for Best Actress

| || Presenter of the award for Best Actor

| || Presenter of the award for Best Director

| || Presenter of the award for Best Picture

Performers (in order of appearance)

{| class="wikitable sortable"

! Name(s) !! Role !! Performed

| Rob Shrock Don Was || Musical Arrangers || Orchestral

| || Performer || Opening number: The Green Mile (to the tune of "Green Acres theme song"), The Sixth Sense (to the tune of "People" from Funny Girl), The Insider (to the tune of Minute Waltz by Frédéric Chopin), The Cider House Rules (to the tune of "Mame" from Mame), and American Beauty (to the tune of "The Lady Is a Tramp" from Babes in Arms)

| Randy Newman || Performers || "When She Loved Me" from Toy Story 2

| || Performer || "Save Me" from Magnolia

| || Performer || "You'll Be in My Heart" from Tarzan

| 'N Sync || Performers || "Music of My Heart" from Music of the Heart

| || Performer || "Blame Canada" from South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut

| Faith Hill Ray Charles Queen Latifah Isaac Hayes Burt Bacharach Dionne Warwick|| Performers || "Everybody's Talkin'" from Midnight Cowboy, "Over the Rainbow" from The Wizard of Oz, "Secret Love" from Calamity Jane, "The Man That Got Away" from A Star Is Born, "I've Got You Under My Skin" from Born to Dance, "All the Way" from The Joker Is Wild, "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head" from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, "Theme from Shaft" from Shaft, "The Way We Were" from The Way We Were, "When You Wish Upon a Star" from Pinocchio, and "Alfie" from Alfie

Ceremony information

thumb|130px|right|[[Billy Crystal hosted the 72nd Academy Awards.|alt=Billy Crystal in 2012.]]

In view of the new millennium, the academy sought to both shorten the telecast and give the ceremony a new look. Husbandandwife producers Richard D. Zanuck and Lili Fini Zanuck were recruited to oversee the production of the 2000 ceremony. Despite Richard and Lili's promises to make changes to the ceremony, they hired actor and veteran Oscar host Billy Crystal to host the ceremony for the seventh time. Art director Bob Keene designed an ambitiously technological stage design for the telecast that used a floor adorned with flashing lights and several 35 foot columns consisting of high-definition video monitors stacked atop each other. Because of serious technical challenges concerning movement, lighting, and overheating, Keene and his production design team tested the stage at ABC Prospect Studios before installing it at the Shrine Auditorium.

Several other people were involved in the production of the ceremony. Actor Peter Coyote, who served as announcer for the telecast, was often seen before commercial breaks live behind the stage. Musical directors Burt Bacharach, Don Was, and Rob Shrock composed a techno-pop soundtrack that substituted for a live orchestra during most of the ceremony. In addition, Bacharach rounded up musicians that included Garth Brooks, Queen Latifah, and Dionne Warwick to perform a medley of songs previously nominated for Best Original Song. Choreographer Kenny Ortega supervised the "Blame Canada" musical number. Whitney Houston was announced as one of performers, but two days before the ceremony she was fired by Bacharach due to being unprepared and unresponsive to direction; Faith Hill filled in for her. The Sixth Sense was the highest earner among the Best Picture nominees with $278.4 million in domestic box office receipts. Only The Sixth Sense (2nd), The Green Mile (13th), The Talented Mr. Ripley (26th), and American Beauty (27th) were nominated for directing, acting, screenwriting, or Best Picture. The other top 50 box office hits that earned the nominations were Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1st), Toy Story 2 (3rd), The Matrix (5th), Tarzan (6th), The Mummy (8th), Stuart Little (11th), and Sleepy Hollow (20th). On March 6, 2000, 1,000 of the ballots were discovered at a US Postal Service regional distribution center in Bell, California. In response to affected members, AMPAS sent replacement ballots sealed in yellow envelopes, and extended the voting deadline by two days to March 23.

Oscar statuettes theft

On March 10, 2000, 55 Oscar statuettes were stolen from a Roadway Express loading dock in Bell, California. In the event the stolen awards were to be still missing during the festivities, AMPAS announced that R.S. Owens & Company, the manufacturer of the awards would produce a new batch of the golden statuettes. Nine days later, 52 of the stolen statuettes were discovered in a trash bin at a Food 4 Less supermarket located in the Koreatown neighborhood of Los Angeles by a man named Willie Fulgear. For the safe recovery of the stolen statuettes, Roadway Express rewarded Fulgear with $50,000, and the academy invited him and his son Allen to the ceremony. Two Roadway Express employees, truck driver Lawrence Ledent and dock worker Anthony Hart, were arrested for the theft of the Oscars. Both men pleaded no contest. Ledent served six months in prison and Hart received probation. A third man who was Mr. Fulgear's half-brother was initially charged with the crime, but police dropped those charges after Mr. Fulgear divulged that they were estranged from each other. Three years later, one of three remaining missing Oscar statuettes was discovered during a drug bust at a mansion in Miami, Florida; the other two have yet to be found.

Critical reviews

The show received a positive reception from most media publications. Television critic Monica Collins of the Boston Herald praised producers Richard and Lili Fini Zanuck for overseeing a show that was "clean, snappy, high-gloss and very well produced." She also quipped that host Billy Crystal did not need to save the show this time because "everything seemed to come together." The San Francisco Examiner Wesley Morris wrote "the show was downright hip, more so than it's been in decades." He also gave high marks for the "techno-chic" production elements from the music and stage design. Columnist Paul Brownfield of the Los Angeles Times raved that "the 72nd annual Academy Awards telecast was hipper than in years past, sleeker in look and edgier in tone." He added that Crystal was "the perfect antidote to the entire evening's self-serious posturing."

Some media outlets were more critical of the show. John Carman of the San Francisco Chronicle lamented that despite being solid and tidy, "the show never quite managed the big surprises, sloppy excesses and emotional highs we hope to see." Pittsburgh Post-Gazette television critic Rob Owen criticized the uneven pacing of the ceremony writing that the telecast "started slowly – 20 minutes of Billy Crystal's spoofs and singing that weren't as funny as his past Oscar intros – and never got up to speed." Caryn James of The New York Times remarked that "the four-hour show turned into a zombie." She also stated that the telecast was bloated with too many tributes to Hollywood's past.

Ratings and reception

The American telecast on ABC drew in an average of 46.52 million viewers over its length, which was a 3% increase from the previous year's ceremony. It also drew a higher 1849 demo rating with a 19.86 rating over a 39.34 share among viewers in that demographic. Two months later, the ceremony won one of those nominations for Louis J. Horvitz's direction of the telecast.

Sylvia Sidney - Actress
Jim Varney - Actor
Ernest Gold – Composer
Ruth Roman - Actress
Henry Jones - Actor
Robert Bresson – Director
Desmond Llewelyn - Actor
Allan Carr – Producer
Mario Puzo – Screenwriter
Rory Calhoun - Actor
Frank Tarloff – Screenwriter
Marc Davis – Animator
Hedy Lamarr - Actress
Victor Mature - Actor
Garson Kanin – Screenwriter
Roger Vadim – Producer/Director
Mabel King - Actress
Oliver Reed - Actor
Albert Whitlock – Special Effects
Ian Bannen - Actor
Abraham Polonsky – Screenwriter
Dirk Bogarde - Actor
Lila Kedrova - Actress
Edward Dmytryk – Director
Charles 'Buddy' Rogers - Actor/musician
Madeline Kahn - Actress
George C. Scott - Actor

References

Bibliography

External links

;Official websites

Academy Awards Official website
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Official website
Oscar's Channel at YouTube (run by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences)

;News resources

Oscars 2000 BBC News
Academy Awards coverage CNN

;Analysis

1999 Academy Awards Winners and History Filmsite
Academy Awards, USA: 2000 Internet Movie Database

Winners and nominees

Awards

Honorary Award

Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award

Films with multiple nominations and awards

Presenters and performers

Presenters (in order of appearance)

Performers (in order of appearance)

Ceremony information

Oscar statuettes theft

Critical reviews

Ratings and reception

See also

References

Bibliography

External links