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Academy Awards Quiz

15 Academy Awards questions with answers and explanations. Read each question, pick an option and reveal the answer — or challenge your friends in a live multiplayer game.

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15 questions, scored on speed. No sign-up.

1. In 1969, an exact tie for the Best Actress Oscar occurred between Katharine Hepburn and which other actress?

  • ABarbra Streisand
  • BJulie Andrews
  • CAnne Bancroft
  • DElizabeth Taylor
Show answer

Barbra Streisand

Hepburn (The Lion in Winter) and Streisand (Funny Girl) drew exactly the same number of votes, the only outright tie ever recorded in the Best Actress category.

2. Which film was the first of only three movies to win the 'Big Five' Oscars (Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, and Screenplay)?

  • ACasablanca
  • BIt Happened One Night
  • CBen-Hur
  • DGone with the Wind
Show answer

It Happened One Night

Frank Capra's 1934 comedy swept all five; only One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) and The Silence of the Lambs (1991) have matched it since.

3. Who was the first actor to be awarded a posthumous Oscar for their performance in the 1976 film 'Network'?

  • AHeath Ledger
  • BSpencer Tracy
  • CPeter Finch
  • DJames Dean
Show answer

Peter Finch

Peter Finch died of a heart attack in January 1977, weeks before the ceremony, and his widow accepted the Best Actor award on his behalf.

4. True or false: The very first Academy Awards ceremony in 1929 was a private dinner held at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel and lasted 15 minutes.

  • ATrue
  • BFalse
Show answer

True

Around 270 guests attended the May 1929 banquet, and because the winners had been made public three months earlier the presentation itself took only about a quarter of an hour.

5. True or false: The 1955 film 'Marty' holds the record for the shortest Best Picture winner, with a total runtime of approximately 90 minutes.

  • ATrue
  • BFalse
Show answer

True

At roughly 90 minutes Marty is the briefest film ever named Best Picture, and it is also one of the very few to win both that Oscar and the Palme d'Or at Cannes.

6. True or false: During World War II, due to metal shortages, the Oscar statuettes were made of painted plaster for a period of three years.

  • ATrue
  • BFalse
Show answer

True

From 1943 to 1945 the Academy handed out painted plaster statuettes, and winners were invited to exchange them for the usual gold-plated bronze once the war ended.

7. True or false: The South Korean film 'Parasite' (2019) was the first non-English language film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture.

  • ATrue
  • BFalse
Show answer

True

Bong Joon-ho's Parasite took Best Picture in February 2020 — the first winner not primarily in English in the award's 92-year history, having already won the Palme d'Or.

8. True or false: Kathryn Bigelow was the first woman to win the Academy Award for Best Director, earning the prize for 'The Hurt Locker' in 2010.

  • ATrue
  • BFalse
Show answer

True

Bigelow won at the March 2010 ceremony honouring 2009 releases, beating her former husband James Cameron and ending 82 years in which no woman had taken the directing award.

9. According to Academy rules, how many films is a single country allowed to submit for consideration in the International Feature category?

  • AOne
  • BUnlimited
  • CTwo
  • DThree
Show answer

One

Each country's designated selection committee may put forward only one film per year, which is why acclaimed titles are sometimes left unsubmitted when a stronger contender is chosen.

10. What is the minimum number of letters in the title of a film that has won the Academy Award for Best Picture?

  • A6
  • B4
  • C3
  • D5
Show answer

4

Gigi (1958) and Argo (2012) share the shortest titles of any Best Picture winner, at four letters each.

11. Walt Disney received a unique honorary Oscar for 'Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs' featuring one standard statue and how many miniatures?

  • AThree
  • BNine
  • CFive
  • DSeven
Show answer

Seven

The 1939 honorary award paired a full-size statuette with seven miniature ones, one per dwarf, and was presented to Disney by the young Shirley Temple.

12. Which Academy Award is bestowed upon individuals whose technological contributions have brought lasting credit to the film industry?

  • AGordon E. Sawyer Award
  • BJean Hersholt Award
  • CBonner Medical Medal
  • DIrving G. Thalberg Award
Show answer

Gordon E. Sawyer Award

Named after the sound engineer who ran Samuel Goldwyn Studios' sound department, the Gordon E. Sawyer Award is an honorary Oscar statuette for a career of technical contribution.

13. The Best Makeup category was officially established after the Academy received complaints about the lack of an award for which 1980 film?

  • AThe Shining
  • BThe Elephant Man
  • CRaging Bull
  • DStar Wars
Show answer

The Elephant Man

Christopher Tucker's prosthetic work on The Elephant Man had no category to compete in, and the resulting outcry pushed the Academy to create a makeup award the following year.

14. Why was 'The Jazz Singer' (1927) excluded from the first-ever Best Picture category at the 1929 Academy Awards?

  • AIt missed the deadline
  • BIt was a sound film
  • CIt was too short
  • DIt was a remake
Show answer

It was a sound film

The Academy judged that a talking picture competing against silent productions would be unfair, and gave the film a special honorary award instead.

15. Which costume designer holds the record for the most Academy Awards won by a woman, with eight wins throughout her career?

  • ASandy Powell
  • BColleen Atwood
  • CMilena Canonero
  • DEdith Head
Show answer

Edith Head

Edith Head won eight costume design Oscars between 1950 and 1974 out of 35 nominations, still the highest total held by any woman.

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