The executive director of the film academy says Farrah Fawcett wasn't included in the Academy Awards In Memoriam segment because the actress was better known as a TV star.

Bruce Davis says it was a difficult decision for the committee that assembles the segment to omit Fawcett and that he's not surprised that some fans and family members are upset.

Fawcett and actor Gene Barry were both omitted from the necrology sequence. Davis says he and his colleagues thought the two were best known for their "remarkable television work" and would be more appropriately honoured by the television academy at the Emmy Awards.

Davis says "an unusual number of extremely distinguished screenwriters" died this year, and the academy tried to honour many of them in the short memorial.