Oscars ‘Daily Bite’: Academy producers to introduce thank-you scroll at this year’s event

Buried under the news about boycotts and protests over the lack of diversity at this year’s Academy Awards is an interesting development: a new way to deliver acceptance speeches.

Every year, the show tries to cap speeches at 45 seconds, and the winners nearly always overstay their welcome. Meryl Streep, to pick just one example, spoke for two-and-a-half minutes in 2012 when she won for “The Iron Lady.” The problem is that there are so many people to thank — agents, lawyers, managers, spouses, parents, you name it. By the time the thank-yous are over, the orchestra has begun playing the get-out-of-here music. (Reportedly it will be Richard Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries,” also known as the helicopter death song in “Apocalypse Now”.)

This year, the show’s producers have come up with the thank-you scroll. It’s a list of names, submitted in advance by each nominee, that will scroll along the bottom of the screen while the winners use their 45 seconds to say something else. The catalyst for this idea was last year’s brushoff of Dana Perry, a winner for the short film “Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1,” who was just beginning to talk about her son’s suicide when the music came on and shut her up.

Will the scroll be a screen-cluttering distraction or easily skimmed like the headline ticker on a cable news show? Will it help the Oscars stay on schedule? There’s also the possibility that winners will simply think of more things to say and more people to thank — and keep right on talking.