FIRST OFF. . .

The worst traffic jam in Academy Awards history will top the agenda when officials of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences meet later this month for their annualpost-Oscar huddle, executive administrator Bruce Davis said Tuesday. The rush-hour gridlock turned the area surrounding the Shrine Auditorium into a lake of limousines and stretched some attendees’ travel times into two-hour ordeals. Some celebrities left their cars and drivers and walked the final half mile to the auditorium, while others were unable to get to their seats before the beginning of the 6 p.m. telecast. Veteran star greeter Army Archerd called the jam a “nightmare,” saying: “The Shrine made the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion (once the focus of traffic complaints) look like the freeway at 2 a.m. . . . I was more a traffic cop than an interviewer.” The academy’s Davis acknowledged the problem: “I can tell you that (academy president) Robert Wise sat with Mayor Bradley at dinner, and they discussed traffic for a good portion of the evening.” Davis didn’t rule out that the awards ceremony might move to a new location next year, but added that the traffic jam might have been a one-time occurrence. “With this change in venue and the greater number of people, there was no way for the police to predict how the traffic flow would work,” he said.