A single image defines the universal charm of the Oscars: a handful of workers unrolling a piece of red cloth at 10 a.m. on a Wednesday. If we extrapolate from the photo, the truth is that it makes little sense. But that’s the way it is. Because this is the Oscars, the world’s most famous award ceremony, which puts on a whole event, full of expectation, journalists and cameras, for something as simple as laying the carpet.

But the gesture is universal and well-known thanks to nearly one hundred years of the awards and is repeated, year after year, with or without a host. It is a starting signal, a rite that says: here we are, we have come to take over televisions, newspapers and magazines for the next week, to give you a topic of conversation and jokes, to do what we do best, show business. And season after season, they succeed.

The red carpet and awards have so much weight culturally and socially that they don’t even need a famous face to accompany them. This Wednesday, on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, at the entrance of the Dolby (which has hosted the award ceremony for 22 years, after moving there from the Shrine Auditorium), some were waiting for Jimmy Kimmel, the comedian who will host the awards for the fourth time next Sunday. He was not announced, but he was expected; besides, the theater where he does his show every night is right across the street from the Dolby, so he was not far from there. But he didn’t show up, and nobody asked for him either. “Oh well, he couldn’t come by, he had some interviews afterward…”, someone from the (immense) Oscars organization team commented. He was not missed. The carpet is an entity in itself that does not need famous names to introduce it.

The red carpet was laid in two parts, partly so that the media could film it slowly and partly because it is very wide and is actually made up of two separate pieces, each about 16 feet wide, that are then carefully joined together. When the dozens of onlookers have disappeared, the workers, mostly Latinos (California has a 50% Latino population), continue working, stapling part of the carpet, placing pieces, making cuts to fit it, preparing it, ironing it at about 175 degrees because there’s a material at the bottom that makes it stick to the floor when heat is applied, like patches for clothes.

The 900 feet of carpet have been placed at the heart of Hollywood Boulevard, which is practically cut off. Only a narrow sidewalk opposite the theater is unimpeded; tourists and mango and watermelon street vendors pass by there. Surprisingly, they don’t really make a profit during these days, as the public has limited access to the Dolby (which is actually the theater adjacent to a shopping center), as well as to other attractions such as many of the stars of the Walk of Fame, the Chinese Theater and the Hard Rock Café, next to the theater. Plus, it’s all fenced off, so even selfies don’t come out the way they should.

This year, the red carpet returns to its usual color after being champagne in 2023. Along its almost 985 feet in length and 33 feet in width, it will be covered by a huge champagne-colored tent through which the nominees and their companions will pass. The award ceremony will follow at 4 p.m. Pacific time (7 p.m. Eastern time); over the course of three and a half hours, 23 awards will be handed out, followed by a party and a luxurious dinner of serrano ham, sushi and waffles. There will be about 3,400 spectators in the theater and about 20 million people on U.S. screens (and several million in 200 other countries), if the figures do not change much from last year. By the time everyone has entered the Dolby theater, that fantasy of red carpets, lights and cameras will begin to fade and, like Cinderella, disappear before midnight. The paraphernalia that has taken 10 days to assemble will be gone in just a few hours. And the red carpet? Some is collected and recycled for other events, some is thrown away. When leaving the gala, some take a piece of it home as a souvenir. Next year, there will be another one, a new one, and the process will start all over again. The show must go on.

Sign up for our weekly newsletter to get more English-language news coverage from EL PAÍS USA Edition