Why Academy Awards are called 'Oscars'

Awards season always brings its fair share of glitz, emotional speeches, and viral moments, but when it comes to the Academy Awards, there’s one tiny detail many viewers repeat every year without a second thought.

From red carpet interviews to social media reactions, fans and celebrities alike talk about who will ‘win an Oscar’, who was ‘snubbed by the Oscars’, and which film is ‘Oscar-worthy’. The phrase has become such a natural part of pop culture that it almost feels timeless, as though it’s always existed alongside Hollywood itself.

Still, despite the nickname being used around the world, the iconic gold statuette didn’t actually start out with that title. Long before it became shorthand for cinematic excellence and had its strict modern-day dress code, the award had a much more formal identity, tied closely to the organisation that created it and the industry it was designed to celebrate.

Hollywood’s most recognisable award began with a far more formal name (NurPhoto/Contributor/Getty Images)

In fact, the Oscar trophy’s official name is the Academy Award of Merit, and the now-famous nickname came later through a mixture of rumours, jokes, and general media influence.

While the specific reason as to how we went from ‘Academy Award of Merit’ to ‘Oscar’ isn’t 100 per cent clear, one of the most widely repeated origin stories, noted by CBS News, involves Margaret Herrick: a former Academy librarian who reportedly thought the statue resembled her Uncle Oscar, prompting staff to adopt the nickname informally.

While that explanation has stuck in popular memory, historians say there are other theories that may be just as plausible.

For instance, film writer Foster Hirsch has pointed to Hollywood columnist Sidney Skolsky, who used the name ‘Oscar’ in a 1934 newspaper column while covering Katharine Hepburn’s win. According to Hirsch: "He thought that the ceremonies were pompous and self-important and he wanted to deflate them in his column," suggesting the nickname may have started as a tongue-in-cheek dig at the grandeur of the event.

One journalist’s sarcastic tone possibly shaped awards history forever (Michael Ochs Archives/Stringer/Getty Images)

He added: "So it was actually a sort of disrespectful or even snide attribution…It was meant to deflate the pomposity of the Academy Award of Merit."

There’s even a theory involving actor Bette Davis, who allegedly joked about the statue’s resemblance to her husband, whose middle name was Oscar. However, experts say this explanation is unlikely because the nickname had already appeared in print earlier.

Regardless of who first said it, the term quickly caught on with journalists and fans who preferred something shorter and catchier. Film historian Robert Osborne once wrote: "[It was] warmly embraced by newsmen, fans and Hollywood citizenry who were finding it increasingly cumbersome to refer to the Academy's Award of Merit as 'the Academy's gold statue,' 'the Academy Award statuette' or, worse, 'the trophy'".