Academy picks "Locker," "Blind Side" producers

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has decided which producers from "The Hurt Locker" and "The Blind Side" can walk up to the stage if either film wins the best picture Oscar on March 7.

When nominees were announced Tuesday, the Academy hadn't decided which producers for the two films would qualify. Under Academy rules, there are normally no more than three producers per film, though the producers branch executive committee can designate additional producers in a "rare and extraordinary circumstance."

That has happened in the case of "Locker," where the officially sanctioned nominees are now listed as director Kathryn Bigelow, Mark Boal, Nicolas Chartier and Greg Shapiro.

Chartier, the Voltage Pictures partner who put up financing for the film, had been the name in question, though the Producers Guild of America, which also polices producing credits, included him when all four producers won the group's top film prize, the Darryl F. Zanuck Producer of the Year Award, last month.

For "Blind," the Academy stuck with three producers: Gil Netter, Andrew A. Kosove and Broderick Johnson.

"Blind" represented a somewhat different situation, though, since there were only three credited producers on the film -- Alcon Prods.' Johnson and Kosove as well as Netter -- and now all three have been acknowledged.