Official Oscar fun comes at a cost. A solo ticket for the five-hour, black-tie optional shindig is a whopping $250. For those not fond of arithmetic, that's $500 per couple. In return, you get snacks, tacos from Wolfgang Puck, free-flowing wine from European Oscar sponsors Clarendelle and Domaine Clarence Dillon, access to museum galleries and store, and a chance for unreserved seating.
For an extra $200, or a total of $400 per couple – that's a grand sum of $900 – they throw in dinner, free beer and cocktails, and reserved seats in the Tea Room.
The Academy seems keen on covering its expenses, which makes sense, considering the financial load that comes with owning the vast movie museum on Fairfax Avenue and Wilshire Boulevard.
This isn't a shocker. Academy folks knew the stakes when they invested a good chunk of their annual Oscar earnings into a glitzy movie showcase a few years back.
Let’s dive into the numbers, though, just to remember that the Oscar ceremony, struggling with ratings and netting around $87 million annually after expenses, mostly from broadcast contracts until 2028, is a somewhat shaky support for the hefty burden that grew since the museum opened in late 2021.
In a less noticed expense breakdown tucked into a footnote in the Academy’s latest audited financial report, for the fiscal year ended last June 30, the tale unfolds.
The museum, with only about $18 million in earned revenue, faced expenses of $91.2 million – a whopping 42 percent of the Academy's total expenses. It overshadowed general and administrative expenditures of about $22 million and exceeded the $56.9 million spent on staging the Academy Awards.
In cold, hard cash, the burden lightened a bit, thanks to $29.7 million in museum expense marked as depreciation, a noncash hit to earnings. However, it still left a museum-related cash expense of $61.5 million, including $10.5 million in debt interest. To put things in perspective, that’s nearly double the $32.2 million collected by the Motion Picture and Television Fund, a Hollywood charity, in 2022.
Subtracting the $18 million in museum income from the $61.5 million in cash expense leaves you $43.5 million in the red for the year. Contributions for fiscal 2023 were $21.7 million, leaving a gap of nearly $22 million, to be filled by Oscar profits and investment income.
Thankfully, the Academy has seen profits and investment gains. But the museum's needs are hefty, the Oscars are shaky, and Academy bigwigs are scrambling for new revenue. Hence, fees for mailing lists, Academy Screening Rooms, red carpet access, and unabashedly commercial sponsorships by Rolex and others.
A somewhat hushed statement in an Oscar bond offering last September now echoes a bit louder. The museum foundation is still seeking pledges from donors, with efforts expected to continue for the next few years. Fundraising is on the horizon, not just by the Biden campaign.
Considering all this, I guess I can wrap my head around the $250 charge for some tacos (courtesy of Wolfgang Puck, mind you) and a sip of wine. And supposedly, the event requires some pricey staging. They claim over 600 tickets have been sold to date, but come March 10, I think I'll be parked on my couch for the viewing.
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