t may not seem like much has changed since then, but in 1928 a group of industry insiders decided to do something about Tinseltown's dubious image. Their solution was quintessentially Hollywood - put on a show. The "show" was the first Academy Awards, held the following May at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. Tickets cost $10, and the self-congratulatory feast drew 250 people.
   Wings, a romance about two World War I fighter pilots who fall for the same girl, won Best Picture, while Emil Jannings nabbed Best Actor (he beat out Charlie Chaplin) and Janet Gaynor took home the first-ever Best Actress trophy.
   The idea of a film industry love-in caught on quickly with the public. The following year, a Los Angeles radio station aired a one-hour live broadcast from the ceremony, and in 1944 the show was heard by American GIs around the world. The first TV broadcast was in 1953, with color telecasts starting in 1966.
   As for that sealed envelope thing, it started in 1941. That was a year after the Los Angeles Times spilled the Oscar results all over
its evening edition, giving away the winners before the show had finished. Now, only a handful of bean counters know the results before the envelopes are ripped open on the big night.
   Despite the industry adage "the show must go on," the Academy Awards have been postponed on three occasions during their 71-year history. The first time was in 1938, when flooding washed out much of Los Angeles, the second was in 1968, following the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., and the third in 1981, when U.S President Ronald Reagan was shot.
   In contrast to the cozy affair in 1929, this year's Oscars will be handed out at L.A.'s 6,500-seat Shrine auditorium. And although $10 was a lot of money for a banquet back then, any price would be a bargain today. The Academy Awards have long been an invitation-only affair.
- Bob Gibson