By Sandy Cohen, Entertainment Writer
LOS ANGELES (AP) --The film academy has tapped Brett Ratner and Don Mischer to produce next year’s Academy Awards.
This will be Ratner’s first involvement with the Oscar show and Mischer’s second: He produced and directed the 2011 Academy Awards telecast and was nominated for an Emmy for his work on the show.
Academy president Tom Sherak made the announcement Thursday.
Mischer said in an interview that he’s excited to oversee the Oscars again.
“I was just so happy to receive the call from the academy saying we’d like to have you come back,” he said. “It was unexpected and a real delight. More than anything, I’m looking forward to working with Brett.”
Ratner said producing the Oscar show is “beyond a dream come true.”
“This wasn’t even in my dreams, it’s so far out,” he said. “This is something I never could have imagined.”
Ratner has produced and directed both film and television. His credits include “X-Men: The Last Stand,” ”Rush Hour” and the pilot of TV’s “Prison Break.” (He also directs commercials via HSI Productions.)
Mischer is a veteran producer and director of live television events, including Super Bowl halftime shows, Olympics opening ceremonies, the Emmy Awards and this year’s Oscars.
Dawn Hudson, chief executive of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, said she is eager to see Mischer’s expertise blend with Ratner’s “smart and fresh take for the show.”
“They have great chemistry,” she said, “and their vision meshed so well with ours.”
The two men declined to reveal their plans. They said they haven’t discussed potential hosts for the show.
“Everything is open at this point,” Mischer said. “We’re just at the starting gate.”
He said they plan to watch past telecasts and “figure out what we can do to make things better.”
Ratner said they plan to start working on the show immediately. “Work begins now,” he said. “We’re going to hang up the phone and get to work.”
The 84th annual Academy Awards will be presented at the Kodak Theatre on Feb. 26, 2012.
Effie UK and Ipsos Report Concludes Marketing Industry Should Do Its Part To Heal Societal Divisions
Society has never been more divided, according to a new report Healing the Divide in which Effie UK and brand and advertising experts from Ipsos explored brands’ role in shaping society and healing societal divisions.
The report details how instability, inflation, and COVID recovery —the convergence of multiple interconnected crises around the world that coincide with and amplify each other, causing hard to resolve systemic challenges, have become the norm over the past few years. As a result, the use of division as a weapon is now a major theme in today’s culture and politics, and sadly 47% of the UK and 49% of the US agree with the statement that “Within my lifetime, society in my country will break down,” according to Ipsos Global Trends 2024.
While some brands have tried to respond to this, the report finds responsible marketing is now threatened by weaponized division. It points to the World Federation of Advertisers’ decision to shut down the Global Alliance for Responsible Media following an antitrust lawsuit filed by Elon Musk’s X, combined with DEI rollbacks, as significant setbacks.
The report says these setbacks underline the importance of marketing in solving collective problems, such as climate change, food security, and harmful online content. It also points to a need for marketers to take more interest in and more responsibility for healing divisions.
Research claims marketers are ideally placed to build and rebuild the antidote to division (trust, empathy, a sense of control, connection and collaboration). According to the Ipsos Veracity index of trusted professionals, society is becoming more trustworthy of advertising executives. Additionally, 57% of Britons agree that brands should communicate their... Read More