The 29th Oscars

NOTE: Early in 1956, the name of blacklisted screenwriter Michael Wilson had been deleted from the screen credits of Friendly Persuasion by Allied Artists, the film's distributor, based on a 1952 agreement between the Screen Writers Guild and various production companies. That agreement gave studios the right to omit from the screen the name of any individual who had failed to clear himself before a duly constituted legislative committee of Congress if accused of Communist affiliations, as was the case with Wilson at the time. The Academy, in the awkward position of possibly conferring its highest honor on someone whose name had been omitted from screen credit, revised its bylaws at a special February 6, 1957, meeting. That revision, in essence, allowed that in such cases, the achievement itself could be eligible for nomination, but the specific writer would be ineligible. The following instructions were sent to Price Waterhouse & Co., Certified Public Accountants, who tabulated Academy ballots: \"...we ask that if, in tabulating the nominations ballots for Best Screenplay (adapted), Friendly Persuasion is one of the five nominations, you list the other four alphabetically by title and below: Friendly Persuasion - Achievement nominated, but writer ineligible for Award under Academy By-Laws.\" On February 17, 1957, the Academy's Board of Governors voted to instruct Price Waterhouse & Co. \"...to list five nominations, and in the event that one of these is declared ineligible under the By-Law provision, four nominations would appear on the final ballot.\" THIS NOMINATION WAS NOT INCLUDED ON THE FINAL BALLOT. (The bylaw was repealed by the Academy as \"unworkable\" on January 12, 1959.) On December 10, 2002, the Academy's Board of Governors voted to reinstate Mr. Wilson's nomination.

NOTE: THIS IS NOT AN OFFICIAL NOMINATION. Edward Bernds and Elwood Ullman, the authors of this Bowery Boys quickie, respectfully withdrew their own names and the nomination, aware that voters had probably mistaken their film with a 1956 MGM release with the same title written by John Patrick and starring Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly and Frank Sinatra. (Even so, MGM's High Society would only have been eligible for adapted screenplay.)