The 55th Academy Awards were presented April 11, 1983, at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles. The ceremonies were presided over by Liza Minnelli, Dudley Moore, Richard Pryor, and Walter Matthau. Louis Gossett Jr. became the first African-American actor to win Best Supporting Actor for his performance as the tough and principled drill instructor Emil Foley in An Officer and a Gentleman. Bhanu Athaiya also became the first Indian to win an Academy Award for Best Costume Design for Gandhi. This marked the first of 28 consecutive years where a Barbara Walters interview special aired before the ceremony. Walters had previously aired an interview special in 1981 and, in subsequent years, her special aired prior to the Academy's formal broadcast of celebrities walking the red carpet. It was also the only time George C. Scott attended an Oscars ceremony.

Richard Franklin Lennox Thomas Pryor Sr. was an American stand-up comedian and actor. He reached a broad audience with his trenchant observations and storytelling style, and is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most important stand-up comedians of all time. Pryor won a Primetime Emmy Award and five Grammy Awards. He received the first Kennedy Center Mark Twain Prize for American Humor in 1998. He won the Writers Guild of America Award in 1974. He was listed at number one on Comedy Central's list of all-time greatest stand-up comedians. In 2017, Rolling Stone ranked him first on its list of the 50 best stand-up comics of all time.