Who has hosted the Oscars the most number of times?
Hosting the Oscars isn’t an easy gig, but if anyone is fortunate enough to go down a storm with the people in attendance and the audience at home, then there’s a distinct possibility they’ll be invited to return as the figurehead of another Academy Awards ceremony.
There’s a reason why James Franco and Anne Hathaway’s excruciatingly forced co-hosting gig is regarded as one of the weakest telecasts in the event’s history, and then they were never contacted again, and the same can be said for the prickly Chevy Chase existing as one of the many hosts who botched their shot and never found themselves under consideration for a second attempt.
Hugh Jackman was fine in 2009, while other one-time emcees include luminaries such as Fred Astaire, Frank Capra, Seth MacFarlane, and Neil Patrick Harris, among others. It’s a tough gig, which makes it all the more remarkable that the person to host the highest number of Oscars did so a whopping 19 times.
Fittingly, then, Bob Hope also holds the distinction of hosting the first-ever Oscars to be broadcast on television in 1953, as well as the maiden colour transmission in 1966. Between 1940 and 1978, he was pretty much the public face of the most prestigious gala for Hollywood’s best and brightest, and while he never won a competitive statue himself, he was richly rewarded with no less than five honorary prizes.
Billy Crystal is in a distant second place, having hosted nine times between 1990 and 2012, with Johnny Carson acting as the Oscars’ on-screen frontman on five occasions in six years between 1979 and 1984, leaving 1983 as the only time he missed out during his stint as its familiar compere.
Jack Lemmon and Whoopi Goldberg are the only four-time hosts until Jimmy Kimmel joins them at this year’s upcoming edition, while Jerry Lewis became the first three-timer in 1959 before being joined by David Niven, Steve Martin, and Conrad Nagel.
No fewer than 13 names have hosted the Oscars twice, but even if you combine them all, it’s still less than the total number of 28 hosted by Hope and Crystal alone. Clearly, those two had something special about them that the Academy found nothing short of irresistible, and it’s difficult to imagine anyone coming within touching distance of either of them at any point in the foreseeable future.
If anyone’s in the mood for splitting hairs, though, Hope was only the sole host on 12 of his 19 times onstage, being joined by a cavalcade of peers, colleagues, and contemporaries for the remaining seven. Not that anyone’s going to try and tear the legendary performer down, but even if they did, that’s still more than Crystal ever managed, as if there were ever any lingering doubts over who the greatest Oscars host of all time was.
