29th Academy Awards — award ceremony presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences for achievement in filmmaking in 1956
The 29th Academy Awards marked the first competitive Best International Feature Film award and highlighted the Hollywood blacklist through the pseudonymous Best Original Story win.
Key Facts
- Date held
- March 27, 1957
- Films honored from
- 1956
- Best Picture winner
- Around the World in 80 Days
- First competitive Intl. Feature winner
- Italy — Federico Fellini's La Strada
- Best Actress winner
- Ingrid Bergman (accepted by Cary Grant)
- Best Original Story winner
- Robert Rich (pseudonym for blacklisted Dalton Trumbo)
By the Numbers
Location
Cause → Event → Consequence
Hollywood's annual recognition cycle for 1956 films brought together a slate of nominees dominated by large-scale color epics. The ongoing blacklist era meant some credited artists worked under pseudonyms, while the Academy simultaneously moved to make the International Feature Film award a competitive category rather than a special achievement honor.
The 29th Academy Awards ceremony was held on March 27, 1957. Around the World in 80 Days won Best Picture without winning Best Director or any acting award. La Strada claimed the first competitive Best International Feature Film award. The Best Original Story Oscar went to the pseudonym Robert Rich, later revealed to be blacklisted writer Dalton Trumbo.
The ceremony's all-color, all-epic Best Picture field helped establish a lasting trend toward spectacle-driven blockbusters in the category. The Robert Rich incident drew public attention to the damage of the Hollywood blacklist. Trumbo was eventually credited under his own name years later, and the competitive international feature category became a permanent fixture of the awards.