The 2024 Academy Awards are handed out on Monday (Australian time), so get your comfiest sweats and popcorn ready to judge the rich and famous from the comfort of your couch.

The 96th iteration of the world-famous awards night will be held at Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre, in Los Angeles, California.

While organisers will no doubt be hoping everything goes according to a strict, fine-tuned schedule, previous years prove anything can happen on Hollywood’s night of nights.

Read on to find out everything you need to know to watch hit movies battle it out at this year’s Academy Awards.

When and where is it airing?

The Academy Awards will kick off at 7pm Sunday in Los Angeles (local time).

For Australians, this means watching it on Monday, March 11.

While 7pm PST equals 2pm AEDT, Channel Seven and 7Plus will air the event live from the morning, meaning viewers will get to watch red carpet arrivals and interviews.

An encore will screen on Monday night.

Who’s hosting?

Hosting an awards show is not for the faint of heart, with many attempts to get easy laughs leading to crickets from the audience.

This year, the awards organisers have returned to Jimmy Kimmel for the dubious honour of event host.

It’s a smart choice, given Kimmel is no stranger to the limelight, or the Academy Awards in particular – this will be his fourth stint as a host of the big event.

Jimmy Kimmel says he always dreamed of hosting the Oscars exactly four times. Photo: AAP

He’ll also probably be able to handle whatever awkwardness happens on stage; Kimmel was the host in 2017, when there was the infamous La La Land / Moonlight best picture mix-up.

Presenters will include Brendan Fraser and Ke Huy Quan – who have each enjoyed a career renaissance in recent years – along with the likes of Chris Hemsworth, Michelle Yeoh, Zendaya, Octavia Spencer, Al Pacino and Matthew McConaughey.

Past highs and lows

Despite the thousands of hours of careful planning that no doubt goes into one of Hollywood’s biggest events of the year, everything doesn’t always go according to plan.

Of course, the Academy Awards has served up some iconic moments on purpose.

Think Ellen DeGeneres’s celebrity-filled 2014 selfie, or instances where wins have broken down industry barriers, such as in 2022 when Halle Berry became the first black woman to win best actress, or 2020 when Parasite became the first non-English language film to win best picture.

If there was ever a Selfie Hall of Fame, this picture would be in it. Photo: Twitter/@theellenshow

But the night has had its fair share of unplanned viral moments as well.

These include John Travolta’s iconic 2014 mispronunciation of Idina Menzel’s name – giving birth to the moniker ‘Adele Dazeem’ – as well as the aforementioned best picture blunder in 2017, Nicole Kidman’s awkward clap the same year, and the 2022 ‘slap-gate’ in which Will Smith slapped host Chris Rock on stage.