More people tuned in to the Academy Awards on Sunday night than last year, which was the least-watched Oscars broadcast ever, but viewership remained low amid disruptions to television- and movie-watching habits.
The 94th edition of the awards show drew 13.73 million viewers on ABC and a 2.9 rating among adults between 18 and 49 years old, according to preliminary national ratings from Nielsen released on Monday that did not include West Coast or online viewership. The early results showed a 32 percent improvement on the 10.4 million people who watched last year’s event, though Sunday night’s show was still the second least-watched Oscars ever.
The telecast took a bizarre turn more than two hours in, when Will Smith strode onstage and slapped Chris Rock in the face for telling a joke about his wife. Mr. Smith then returned to his seat, and less than an hour later, he won the best actor prize.
The initial numbers from Nielsen did not indicate whether there was a surge in viewership after the slap, which immediately ricocheted around the internet.
Organizers have been desperate to reverse a yearslong ratings slide for the Oscars, which saw viewership last year plummet 58 percent. To perk up interest, they hired the comics Regina Hall, Amy Schumer and Wanda Sykes to host a show that had been hostless since 2019; relegated some awards to a pretaped segment to speed things up; and invited fans to vote on Twitter for their favorite film (Zack Snyder’s “Army of the Dead”).
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