As we all (probably) know, Will Smith walked on stage to slap Chris Rock during the Oscars last year. It was unprecedented. Shocking. It even became a meme.
But the academy is prepared to prevent controversial attention this year — it’s enlisted a crisis team, so there should be no surprises at the awards show this year.
“(We) have a whole crisis team, something we’ve never had before, and many plans in place,” Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences CEO Bill Kramer revealed in an interview with Time. “We’ve run many scenarios. So it is our hope that we will be prepared for anything that we may not anticipate right now but that we’re planning for just in case it does happen.”
Kramer shared in vague detail how the crisis team will operate if an unwanted incident occurs. He says there will be a crisis communication that has “structures” in place so it can gather and react swiftly.
“Obviously depending on the specifics of the crisis, and let’s hope something doesn’t happen and we never have to use these, but we already have frameworks in place that we can modify,” Kramer shared with Time.
The 95th annual Academy Awards will be held Sunday, March 12, at 6 p.m. MST on ABC. Jimmy Kimmel will host the ceremony, per the Deseret News.