WASHINGTON (AP) — Celebrities, cultural icons and a few surprise guests are gathering for the annual Kennedy Center Honors celebration Sunday evening in Washington.
This year's recipients of the lifetime achievement award for artistic accomplishment are director Francis Ford Coppola,the Grateful Dead, jazz trumpeter Arturo Sandoval, and singer-songwriter Bonnie Raitt. In addition, the venerable Harlem theater The Apollo, which has launched generations of Black artists, is being recognized.
There will be personalized tributes with performances and testimonials from fellow artists during the gala at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Medallions were presented during the traditional Saturday night ceremony at the State Department.
The tribute performances are often kept secret from the recipients themselves, most notably in 2018 when Cyndi Lauper flat out lied to her longtime friend Cher about being unable to attend. Lauper appeared on stage to perform Cher's hit, “If I Could Turn Back Time.”
Several of the latest honorees have themselves participated in past tributes to friends and colleagues at the Kennedy Center.
Coppola spoke during fellow director Martin Scorsese’s induction in 2007. Sandoval performed in the tribute to his mentor, jazz trumpet legend Dizzy Gillespie. Raitt has taken part in tributes to Buddy Guy and Mavis Staples. Raitt even attended the Kennedy Center Honors in the 1970s when her father, Broadway performer John Raitt, was taking part in a tribute to composer Richard Rogers.
The tribute to the Grateful Dead is expected to double as a memorial to the band's founding bass player Phil Lesh, who died in October at age 84.
This could also be the last Kennedy Center Honors ceremony without political intrigue for a while.
During Republican Donald Trump's first four years in office, Kennedy Center officials were forced to walk a public tightrope between the tradition of the president attending the ceremony and the open antipathy toward Trump from multiple honorees. In 2017, recipient Norman Lear threatened to boycott his own ceremony if Trump attended. Trump, who takes office in January, skipped the ceremony for the entirety of his first term.
At a ceremony at the White House before attending the awards event itself, President Joe Biden praised each honoree. He also had an audience member, actor Robert De Niro, stand before declaring, “If I get in trouble, I’m coming to you pal.”
De Niro grinned and nodded and others in attendance, including the honorees, laughed at what appeared to be a reference to De Niro sometimes playing hardnosed enforcers in movies like “The Godfather.” But Biden actually meant he might seek the actor’s help for post-presidency career advice.
“Things are not looking good for February,” Biden joked. Then he conceded that he couldn’t sing or dance but suggested he might still find a way to help De Niro’s production company.
The awards show will air on CBS on Dec. 22.
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