According to reports, the Academy Awards’ TV ratings have plummeted to a historic low.

Only 9.85 million people watched the presentation on Sunday, when Searchlight’s “Nomadland” won the top honor and Netflix took home the most awards. According to Nielsen’s early fast national estimates, that’s a roughly 59 percent reduction from the 23.6 million people who tuned in for the show last year.

It was a strange occasion, strongly influenced by the epidemic, with a smaller guest list and location, and several candidates participating exclusively through video. Steven Soderbergh co-produced it and chose to make some big and contentious modifications to the structure and aesthetic. When questioned about ratings earlier this month, he was unconcerned.

“We’re worrying about things we can control, and that’s not on that list,” he explained to the Hollywood Reporter. “We’re just making something that we would want to see, that we would think is a good show, because if you’re doing anything other than that, you’re second guessing and you’re lost.”

The event also received mixed reactions and raised fresh issues about the sorts of films that the industry produces and wishes to celebrate.

“It was agonizing for me to get through the show last night. It was pure torture,” said Marc Berman, a seasoned television analyst who runs the “Programming Insider” newsletter.

Other recent award shows have likewise set new lows.

For example, the 2021 Golden Globes got just 6.9 million viewers and a 1.5 rating among adults 18-49, while the prior year’s ceremony dropped 2 percent to an eight-year low in 2019. The 63rd Annual Grammy Awards, presented by Trevor Noah, were the lowest-rated in Grammys history, falling by over 53% compared to the 2020 ceremony. Whether caused by a pandemic or not, award show attendance has been declining in recent years.

The Oscars perform best in years when big films are nominated for best picture — the show garnered 55 million people when “Titanic” won best picture in 1998 — but no other film had the same effect. As a result, viewers were subjected to “long acceptance speeches from people you don’t know in movies you never heard of,” according to Berman.