Press Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
September 11, 2007
RECEIVE 30TH ANNUAL KENNEDY CENTER HONORS
America to Celebrate the Careers of Five Extraordinary Artists,
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Gala will be broadcast on CBS on Wed., Dec. 26 at 9pm (EST)
WA****NGTON, D.C.-The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
announced the selection of the individuals who will receive the Kennedy
Center Honors of 2007. Recipients to be honored at the 30th annual
national celebration of the arts are: pianist Leon Fleisher, actor and
writer Steve Martin, singer Diana Ross, film director Martin Scorsese,
and songwriter Brian Wilson.
"With their extraordinary talent, creativity, and perseverance, the five
2007 Honorees have transformed the way we, as Americans, see, hear and
feel the performing arts. We will forever be thankful for the great gift
they have shared with us," said Kennedy Center Chairman Stephen A.
Schwarzman. "Leon Fleisher is a consummate musician whose career is a
moving testament to the life-affirming power of art; Steve Martin is a
Renaissance comic whose talents wipe out the boundaries between artistic
disciplines; Diana Ross's singular, instantly recognizable voice has
spread romance and joy throughout the world; Martin Scorsese is a
visionary filmmaker and a fearless artist; and Brian Wilson led not only
a spectacularly popular rock group but also an era-defining
transformation of the sound of music."
The annual Honors Gala has become the highlight of the Wa****ngton
cultural year, and its broadcast on CBS, is a high point of the
television season. On Sunday, December 2, in a star-studded celebration
on the Kennedy Center Opera House stage, produced by George Stevens Jr.,
the 2007 Honorees will be saluted by great performers from Hollywood and
the arts capitals of the world. Seated with the President of the United
States and Mrs. Bush, the Honorees will accept the thanks of their peers
and fans through performances and heartfelt tributes. Past performances
have included massed virtuoso violins, multiple marching bands, and
superstars from Hollywood, Nashville, Motown, Paris, London and more,
all performing tributes to the Honorees.
The President and Mrs. Bush will receive the Honorees and members of the
Artists Committee, who nominate them, along with the Kennedy Center
Board of Trustees at the White House prior to the gala performance. The
2007 Kennedy Center Honors Gala concludes with a supper dance in the
Grand Foyer.
The Kennedy Center Honors will be bestowed the night before the gala on
Saturday, December 1, at a State Department dinner, hosted by the
Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice. The Honors Gala will be recorded
for broadcast on the CBS Network on Wednesday, December 26 at 9pm (EST)
for the 30th consecutive year as a two-hour prime time special.
Stevens, who created the Honors in 1978 with Nick Vanoff, will produce
and co-write the show for the 30th year. The Honors telecast has been
honored with five Emmy's for Outstanding Program and is nominated again
this year. It has also been recognized with the Peabody Award for
Outstanding Contribution to Television and seven awards from the Writers
Guild of America.
The Boeing Company is the exclusive underwriter of the 2007 Kennedy
Center Honors Gala and weekend of events, which includes the honorees
luncheon and post-gala supper dance in the Grand Foyer.
Delta Air Lines, the official airline of the Kennedy Center Honors
television broadcast, will provide trans****tation for the performers and
television crew that will be coming to Wa****ngton for the Honors Gala.
The Honors recipients recognized for their lifetime contributions to
American culture through the performing arts- whether in dance, music,
theater, opera, motion pictures or television-are selected by the
Center's Board of Trustees. The primary criterion in the selection
process is excellence. The Honors are not designated by art form or
category of artistic achievement; the selection process, over the years,
has produced balance among the various arts and artistic disciplines.
Members of the Kennedy Center's national artists committee, as well as
past Honorees, made recommendations of possible Honorees. Among the
artists making recommendations were: Emanuel Ax, Dan Aykroyd, Jon Robin
Baitz, Dave Brubeck, Kenny Chesney, Francis Ford Coppola, Melissa
Etheridge, Laurence Fishburne, Renee Fleming, Anjelica Huston,
India.Arie, Evgeny Kissin, Rob Marshall, Peter Martins, Terrence
McNally, Helen Mirren, Anna Netrebko, Christopher Plummer, Nadja
Salerno-Sonnenberg, Catherine Zeta-Jones. Previous Kennedy Center
Honorees Edward Albee, Julie Andrews, Carol Burnett, Sean Connery, Bill
Cosby, Kirk Douglas, Elton John, Mike Nichols, Smokey Robinson and
Steven Spielberg also made nominations.
Michael M. Kaiser, President of the Center, expressed the national
cultural center's gratitude to the many individuals involved in the
success of the Honors program. "In addition to recognizing our most
treasured artists, the Kennedy Center Honors also sup****ts many of our
performing arts initiatives, education and public service programming,
and national outreach efforts."
ENDS.
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