Come Sunday night, though, filmdom's biggest stars will be back on the famed boulevard, posing for photos and waving to fans, as they arrive at the 74th Annual Academy Awards.

That magical night will mark the return of the Oscars to movie-making's mythical home, Hollywood.

It was in Hollywood, in 1929, that the industry's most fabled evening got its start. But like the big studios and the big stars, the Academy Awards left Hollywood more than 40 years ago.

The show's been a vagabond all along, moving from hotel ballrooms to movie theaters and auditoriums in Los Angeles and Santa Monica.

This year, its golden knight is settling down - for at least a while.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has a new theater, built to its specifications, in a new shopping center at the corner of Hollywood and Highland boulevards.

"It just feels like we're back home - finally," said Bruce Davis, the academy's executive director.

The return to Hollywood brings the Oscars full circle and gives filmdom a chance to reflect on the storied past of what has become one of the most widely watched events in the world.

The show started its run in the Blossom Room of the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, a historic hostelry across the street and a half-block west of the Kodak Theatre that will host Sunday's show. Back then, the award wasn't even known as Oscar. It was simply a gold statuette presented at a black-tie banquet.

There were just 270 guests and no surprises. The winners had been announced three months earlier.

The honored films were all silent, with the exception of a special award presented to Warner Bros. for the first talking movie, "The Jazz Singer."

Fifteen statuettes were handed out, and all but one went to men. Actress Janet Gaynor, the only female winner, recalled the high point of the evening was not the award but "the chance to meet the dashing Douglas Fairbanks."

A year later, the ceremony rated more fanfare. It was broadcast live by Los Angeles news radio station KNX. It's had broadcast coverage ever since.

The academy presented just seven awards that year. At this year's ceremony, there will be 25, including the "Feature Animation" award presented for the first time.

Oscar finally got a name in 1935, but the precise source of his moniker remains a mystery. The academy has traced it to three possibilities.

It may have originated with the academy's librarian, who said the trophy looked like her Uncle Oscar.

Or a Hollywood columnist may have dreamed it up because he was tired of trying to find synonyms for the 13 1/2-inch, 8 1/2-pound award.

Or actress Bette Davis may have named it after her husband, Harmon Oscar Nelson Jr., who she said resembled certain aspects of the golden statuette.

Wherever its name came from, Scott Siegel, president of the company that makes the Oscar, said no other award "is as universally recognized."

"We treat it with the extra special loving care that it deserves," he said.

In 2000, though, the entire shipment of Oscars was stolen from a loading dock in Bell, embarrassing everyone involved and jeopardizing the awards show. The manufacturer hastily created new trophies, and the show went on as scheduled - as it has with only three exceptions.

Even then, the show was merely postponed. The first time, in 1938, devastating floods swept through Los Angeles and the ceremony was delayed a week.

In 1968, after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., it was postponed two days because it would have taken place on the day of his funeral. In 1981, the ceremony was delayed for 24 hours because of the assassination attempt on President Reagan.

Over the years, the academy has tried to make it a suspense-filled evening by keeping the winners a secret.

In the early days, though,the academy gave the names in advance to the newspapers for publication in the next day's editions. That changed after guests arriving for the 1940 ceremony bought an early edition of the next day's Los Angeles Times and learned the winners' names before they were announced from the stage. Thus began the sealed-envelope system still in use today.

For the first 15 years, the ceremonies were banquets, held, after the first one in the Blossom Room, at the stylish Ambassador and Biltmore hotels.

With the guest list growing and the shortages of World War II, the academy abandoned the banquet and shifted the show to theaters.

The first, in 1944, was at the legendary Grauman's Chinese Theatre where the handprints, footprints and even hoof prints (Trigger, Roy Rogers' horse) of the stars are immortalized in concrete.

Network radio covered the event for the first time that year and broadcast it to American soldiers stationed abroad.

The academy wasn't eager to have television broadcast its special evening. The studio bosses feared this new medium would cut into movie ticket sales.

In 1953, the academy finally acceded to NBC's request to air the show. It needed the $100,000 NBC paid because several major studios had withdrawn their financial support for the ceremony.

The first television broadcast aired from the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood, which is now hosting the hit musical "The Lion King." The Pantages was also the site of the last Academy Awards in Hollywood on April 4, 1960.

With the television coverage came increased attention and increased security. Security is expected to be at an all-time high Sunday because of the added concern of possible terrorist attacks.

(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, http://www.shns.com.)