The Kennedy Center Honors have been handed out since 1978. Recipients hail from various branches of the American performance art world — including film, stage, music, and dance — even though performers more closely associated with British show business have managed to sneak in every now and then, e.g., Paul McCartney, Roger Daltrey, Elton John, Pete Townshend. Since recipients are supposed to attend the Washington, D.C., ceremony in order to take home their Kennedy awards, Doris Day has remained unhonored by the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Katharine Hepburn kept putting it off until she finally relented in 1990. (Irene Dunne, see above photo, was one who managed to be honored though absent due to ill health.) Ginger Rogers, for her part, was present at the ceremony, but her films with Fred Astaire weren't — because Astaire's widow, Robyn Astaire, demanded payment for the televised clips. At the time, Kennedy Center Honors...
- 9/7/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Two-time Academy Award-winning actress Meryl Streep (right), singer Barbara Cook, singer and songwriter Neil Diamond, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, and saxophonist and composer Sonny Rollins will receive the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts' 2011 Kennedy Center Honors. The Kennedy Center Honors ceremony will be held on Sunday, December 4, on the Kennedy Center Opera House stage. The Kennedy Center Honors medallions will be presented on Saturday, December 3, at a State Department dinner hosted by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. An edited version of the ceremony will be broadcast on CBS for the 34th consecutive year as a two-hour primetime special on Tuesday, December 27, at 9:00 p.m. (Et/Pt). The event will be produced by George Stevens Jr. and Michael Stevens. From the Kennedy Center Honors' press release: "The Honors recipients recognized for their lifetime contributions to American culture through the performing arts—whether in dance, music, theater, opera, motion pictures,...
- 9/7/2011
- by Anna Robinson
- Alt Film Guide
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