"Conan O'Brien Exposes Odd Academy Rules for Oscars Statues in Promos"

Today in weird news, recent Oscars host Conan O'Brien revealed that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences refused to allow him and his team to clothe an Oscar statue or lay it horizontally for promotional ads they pitched for the ceremony. Who knew the Academy was so particular about their iconic statue?

Speaking on his Oscars head writer Mike Sweeney's podcast, Conan Needs a Friend, O'Brien set the scene: he pitched a series of ads in which he and a 9-foot tall Oscar statue were portrayed as being in a domestic partnership. However, the Academy wasn't exactly receptive to how he wanted to utilize the statue specifically.

Keep that Oscar upstanding. Photo by Patrick T. Fallon / AFP.

"We're fighting about things couples fight about," O'Brien explained of one of his ideas. "At one point, I thought, wouldn’t it be great if it’s just on the couch? Let’s lay it on a really big couch and I’ll be vacuuming and say, ‘Could you at least lift your feet? Or could you at least get up and help? Load the dishwasher?’ We wanted to do it, and they just said, ‘No, no, no, that can’t happen.’"

For such a benign — and generally cute — idea, it's puzzling as to why the Academy was so emphatic about not doing it. But it turns out they have some very specific and unusual rules for their statue iconography.

"One of the people from the Academy came forward and said, ‘Oscar can never be horizontal.’ And that blew my mind," O'Brien added. "Like, wow, this is like the thigh bone of St. Peter. This is a religious icon." The comedian also noted on the podcast that the Academy representatives also demanded that the statue is "always naked," so their idea to have the statue serving O'Brien leftovers as an apron-clad housewife was also a no-go for the organization.

The History of Comic Book Movies at the Oscars

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Again, these decisions might seem odd to the casual observer, but the Academy has the right to enforce them. It's a shame we couldn't see the full range of O'Brien's comedic talents in these promos. Hopefully, he'll come out of the gate with something equally witty next year — and yes, we're Team Conan for Oscar Host 2026.