The 43rd Academy Awards ceremony, presented by Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, was held on April 15, 1971, and took place at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion to honor the best films of 1970. The Awards presentation, hosting duties were handled by 34 "Friends of Oscar" and broadcast by NBC for the first time in 11 years. It was during this ceremony that George C. Scott became the first actor to reject an Oscar, claiming that the Academy Awards were "a two-hour meat parade, a public display with contrived suspense for economic reasons." 

Lillian Diana Gish (October 14, 1893 – February 27, 1993) was an American pioneering actress of the screen and stage, and a director and writer. Her film acting career spanned 75 years, from 1912, in silent film shorts, to 1987. Gish was called "The First Lady of American Cinema," and is credited with pioneering fundamental film performance techniques. Gish was a prominent film star from 1912 into the 1920's, being particularly associated with the films of director D. W. Griffith. This included her leading role in the highest-grossing film of the silent era, Griffith's The Birth of a Nation (1915). At the dawn of the sound era, she returned to the stage and appeared in film infrequently, including well-known roles in the controversial western Duel in the Sun (1946) and the thriller The Night of the Hunter (1955). She also did considerable television work from the early 1950's into the 1980's, and closed her career playing opposite Bette Davis in the 1987 film The Whales of August. During her later years, Gish became a dedicated advocate for the appreciation and preservation of silent film. Despite being better known for her film work, she was also accomplished on stage and was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 1972.