Billy Crystal Prepares for Oscars
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ABC/A.M.P.A.S.(LOS ANGELES) — We are three weeks away from the presentation of the 84th annual Academy Awards. The ceremony will be held at the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles on Sunday, Feb. 26.
Billy Crystal will host the Oscars for the ninth time, a high water mark only surpassed by Bob Hope, who hosted 19 times. It was Crystal’s participation in a Bob Hope tribute at last year’s Oscars — and the audience’s reaction to him in an otherwise critically flamed show — that inspired him to return as host.
He jokes, “That reception I got last year touched me so deeply that I probably should’ve quit last year. It really made me think about wanting to be here again.”
Crystal won’t divulge any details regarding the monologue and sketches he has planned for this year’s ceremony, but he says, “There’s so much expected of this, we just tell people, ‘Please lower your expectations, and we’ll have a good time, we’ll figure out something good to do, I know.'”
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