Nickelodeon Sets Kids Choice Awards 2024 For July; Latest Ceremony In Over 30 Years
Nickelodeon Sets Kids Choice Awards 2024 For July; Latest Ceremony In Over 30 Years
Don’t be alarmed, there’s a good reason they’re being held so late, and it’s because there’s nautical nonsense afoot
When Sandler’s Handlings began just over a year ago, the first thing I covered was the cast reveal for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem at the Kids Choice Awards. Now, it’s that year+ later and not even the nominees have been announced. It turns out there’s a good reason for that. The Kids Choice Awards are swinging from its earliest date ever to one of its latest, as this year’s ceremony isn’t happening until July. News regarding host and nominations will be coming “shortly”, according to the press release.
Nickelodeon has set Saturday, July 13 at 8 PM for Kids Choice Awards 2024, and they’re bringing it back to the Pauley Pavilion on the campus of UCLA in Los Angeles for the first time since 2010 when Kevin James hosted…for Grown Ups? In the years since the show last left the Pavilion, it bounced around for the entire 2010s between the Galen Center and The Forum thanks to the latter’s renovations, intended to stay there for the 2020 ceremony hosted by Chance the Rapper, until COVID struck and it was held virtually at Victoria Justice’s home. It was held at the Barker Hangar…at the Santa Monica Airport in 2021 and 2022 before moving to the Microsoft Theater last year. Meanwhile, the Pauley Pavilion did host the Kids Choice Sports Awards in the first four of the six years it existed before it moved to Barker Hangar and then never came back from COVID.
The July 13 date is the second-latest a regular Kids Choice Awards has ever been, with the latest being November 14, 1992, the sixth ever, hosted by Holly Robinson(-Peete), Tori Spelling and Brian Austin Green at Universal Studios Hollywood. A KCA had never been held in the months of July to December otherwise. In fact, this July weekend was when Kids Choice Sports was held for all six years. But why is the main show here? Glory to the almighty Sponge. That’s right, it’s to coincide with the 25th anniversary of the regular premiere of SpongeBob SquarePants, July 17, 1999 despite its sneak preview premiere famously being a Kids Choice Awards leadout on May 1, 1999. Segments will be dedicated to the sponge as part of the yearlong celebration (though January and February seemed to not have been so fruitful). When SpongeBob turned 20 in 2019, the Kids Choice Awards’ contribution to the celebration was the cast of the Broadway musical performing its version of “Best Day Ever” and the theme song, a precursor to the filmed version of the full musical that would premiere by the end of the year.
“This summer, Nickelodeon will celebrate two of its biggest and most beloved franchises--the KCAs and SpongeBob SquarePants,” said Ashley Kaplan, the executive vice president of Nickelodeon Unscripted & Digital Studio. “Celebrating both in July creates incredible opportunities for both properties that win on every platform. Get ready for some nautical nonsense on the KCAs… Slime included!”
Source: NickAlive (via press release)