Oscar-nominated The Hurt Locker producer Nicolas Chartier will be denied attendance at the 2010 Academy Awards ceremony. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced today that "should The Hurt Locker be announced as the recipient of the Best Picture award at Sunday’s ceremonies, only three of the picture’s producers will be present for the celebration." The Iraq War drama's other nominated producers are director Kathryn Bigelow, screenwriter Mark Boal, and Greg Shapiro.
Chartier is being punished "for violating Academy campaigning standards." The producer had recently sent out an e-mail (according to some sources, there were several such e-mails) to various Academy voters and other film industry figures soliciting votes for The Hurt Locker while disparaging its strongest competitor, the blockbuster Avatar, which coincidentally had been directed, written and co-produced by Bigelow's former husband James Cameron.
In addition to disallowing e-mail solicitations, Academy rules expressly prohibit “casting a negative or derogatory light on a competing film.”
As per the Academy's press release, at a special session late Monday the executive committee of the Academy’s Producers Branch ruled that Chartier's "ethical lapse" merited the revocation of his invitation to the awards ceremony. The group stopped short of recommending that the Academy governors rescind Chartier’s nomination — his first ever and an exception to Academy rules, which demand a maximum of three producers per Best Picture nominee except in extraordinary circumstances.
If The Hurt Locker is chosen as the Best Picture of 2009, Chartier will get his Oscar statuette at a later date.
The 2010 Academy Awards ceremony will take place on Sunday, March 7 at the Kodak Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center. In the United States, it'll be televised live by ABC.
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