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AMERICAN FILM INSTITUTE ANNOUNCES NEW DATE FOR 49TH AFI LIFE ACHIEVEMENT AWARD HONORING NICOLE KIDMAN

Gala Tribute Set to Take Place on April 27, 2024

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, November 13, 2023, Los Angeles, CA – The American Film Institute (AFI) announced today that the 49th AFI Life Achievement Award Gala Tribute celebrating Nicole Kidman will take place April 27, 2024, at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles. The event was originally scheduled for 2023. The air dates for the Emmy® Award-winning Tribute special on TNT and Turner Classic Movies (TCM) will be announced at a later date.

As previously announced, Kidman is the first Australian actor to receive the AFI Life Achievement Award. Both a powerhouse performer, spellbinding movie star and accomplished producer, Nicole Kidman has captured the imaginations of audiences throughout her prolific career, delivering complex and versatile performances onscreen. Seamlessly moving between independent and studio films, Kidman has earned a reputation for her extraordinary talent, commitment to her craft and desire to work with auteur filmmakers including Jane Campion, Sofia Coppola, Baz Luhrmann, Anthony Minghella, Sydney Pollack, Lars von Trier, Aaron Sorkin and Stanley Kubrick.

A five-time Academy Award® nominee, Kidman’s wonderfully restrained and transformational turn as Virginia Woolf in THE HOURS earned her the Oscar® for Best Actress in 2003. Following her stunning breakthrough performance in 1989’s DEAD CALM, Kidman has captivated global audiences, from her daring performance as Alice Harford in EYES WIDE SHUT and enchanting Satine in MOULIN ROUGE!, to her raw turn as Grace Margaret Mulligan in DOGVILLE and her enthralling portrayal of Lucille Ball in BEING THE RICARDOS. Throughout her distinguished career, Kidman has won a BAFTA Award, two Emmys® and six Golden Globes – and is widely regarded as one of the finest actresses of her generation. She co-founded her production company Blossom Films in 2010.

Across film and television, she has delivered remarkably nuanced performances characterized by their unflinching courage, vulnerability and tenacity, with additional acting credits including: DAYS OF THUNDER (1990), FAR AND AWAY (1992), BATMAN FOREVER (1995), TO DIE FOR (1995), THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY (1996), PRACTICAL MAGIC (1998), THE OTHERS (2001), THE HUMAN STAIN (2003), COLD MOUNTAIN (2003), BIRTH (2004), THE INTERPRETER (2005), AUSTRALIA (2008), NINE (2009),  RABBIT HOLE (2010), THE PAPERBOY (2012), STOKER (2013), PADDINGTON (2014), QUEEN OF THE DESERT (2015), LION (2016), THE KILLING OF A SACRED DEER (2017), THE BEGUILED (2017), THE UPSIDE (2017), BOY ERASED (2018), DESTROYER (2018), AQUAMAN (2018), BOMBSHELL (2019), and THE NORTHMAN (2022). She has also starred in and produced multiple critically acclaimed television programs, including HEMINGWAY & GELLHORN (2012), BIG LITTLE LIES (2017-2019), TOP OF THE LAKE (2017), THE UNDOING (2020), NINE PERFECT STRANGERS (2021) and SPECIAL OPS: LIONESS (2023).

In theater, Kidman made a highly lauded London stage debut in the fall of 1998, starring with Iain Glen in “The Blue Room,” David Hare’s modern adaptation of Schnitzler’s “La Ronde.” For her performance, Kidman won London’s Evening Standard Award and was nominated in the Best Actress category for a Laurence Olivier Award. In 2015, Kidman was seen on the West End stage in Anna Ziegler’s “Photograph 51,” for which she received a London’s Evening Standard Award.

In January of 2006, Kidman was awarded Australia’s highest honor, the Companion of the Order of Australia. She was also awarded the Berlin Film Festival’s Silver Bear award for her performance in THE HOURS. In 2017, the Cannes Film Festival honored Kidman with the 70th Anniversary Prize for her body of work and longstanding history with the festival. She is one of only eight people to ever receive this honor.

Kidman has served as Goodwill Ambassador for UN Women for nearly two decades. Along with her husband, Keith Urban, she has helped raise millions over the years for the Stanford Women’s Cancer Program which is a world-renowned center for research into the causes, treatment, prevention, and eventual cure of women’s cancer.

Kidman’s many upcoming projects include Lulu Wang’s EXPATS for Amazon, AQUAMAN AND THE LOST KINGDOM for Warner Brothers and HOLLAND, MICHIGAN for Amazon.

AFI Life Achievement Award Recipients

The 49th AFI Life Achievement Award Honoree joins an esteemed group of individuals who have been chosen for this distinguished honor since its inception.

1973   John Ford

1974   James Cagney

1975   Orson Welles

1976   William Wyler

1977   Bette Davis

1978   Henry Fonda

1979   Alfred Hitchcock

1980   James Stewart

1981   Fred Astaire

1982   Frank Capra

1983   John Huston

1984   Lillian Gish

1985   Gene Kelly

1986   Billy Wilder

1987   Barbara Stanwyck

1988   Jack Lemmon

1989   Gregory Peck

1990   David Lean

1991   Kirk Douglas

1992   Sidney Poitier

1993   Elizabeth Taylor

1994   Jack Nicholson

1995   Steven Spielberg

1996   Clint Eastwood

1997   Martin Scorsese

1998   Robert Wise

1999   Dustin Hoffman

2000   Harrison Ford

2001   Barbra Streisand

2002   Tom Hanks

2003   Robert De Niro

2004   Meryl Streep

2005   George Lucas

2006   Sean Connery

2007   Al Pacino

2008   Warren Beatty

2009   Michael Douglas

2010   Mike Nichols

2011   Morgan Freeman

2012   Shirley MacLaine

2013   Mel Brooks

2014   Jane Fonda

2015   Steve Martin

2016   John Williams

2017   Diane Keaton

2018   George Clooney

2019   Denzel Washington

2022   Julie Andrews

About the AFI Life Achievement Award

The highest honor given for a career in film, the AFI Board of Trustees established the AFI Life Achievement Award in 1973. It is presented to a single honoree each year based on the following criteria as mandated through a resolution passed by the AFI Board of Trustees: “The recipient should be one whose talent has in a fundamental way advanced the film art; whose accomplishment has been acknowledged by scholars, critics, professional peers and the general public; and whose work has stood the test of time.”

Most recently, the 48th AFI Life Achievement Award Tribute gathered American film’s finest to honor Julie Andrews on June 9, 2022, at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood. The event saw Carol Burnett, Cynthia Erivo, Steve Carell, Kristin Chenoweth, Kelly Clarkson, Ariana DeBose, Anne Hathaway, Hugh Jackman, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Dick Van Dyke, Jane Seymour, Héctor Elizondo, Bo Derek, Gwen Stefani and cast members from THE SOUND OF MUSIC – Angela Cartwright, Duane Chase, Nicholas Hammond, Kym Karath and Debbie Turner – pay tribute to Andrews’ extraordinary life and body of work.

 

About the American Film Institute (AFI)

The American Film Institute (AFI) is a nonprofit organization with a mandate to champion the moving image as an art form. Established in 1967, AFI launched the first comprehensive history of American film and sparked the movement for film preservation in the United States. In 1969, AFI opened the doors of the AFI Conservatory, a graduate-level program to train narrative filmmakers. The Conservatory, which counts Deniese Davis, Affonso Gonçalves, Susannah Grant, Matthew Libatique, David Lynch, Melina Matsoukas and Rachel Morrison as Alumni, is ranked the #1 film school in America. AFI’s enduring traditions include the AFI Life Achievement Award, which honors the masters for work that has stood the test of time; AFI AWARDS, which celebrates the creative ensembles of the most outstanding screen stories of the year; and scholarly efforts such as the AFI Catalog of Feature Films and the AFI Archive that preserve film history for future generations. AFI exhibition programs include AFI FEST and year-round exhibition at the AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center in Maryland. AFI Movie Club is a destination for movie lovers from around the world to celebrate and engage with the art form every day. Other pioneering programs include workshops aimed at increasing diversity in the storytelling community, including AFI DWW+ and the AFI Cinematography Intensive for Women. Read about all of these programs and more at AFI.com and follow us on social media at Facebook.com/AmericanFilmInstitute, YouTube.com/AFITwitter.com/AmericanFilm and Instagram.com/AmericanFilmInstitute.

 

Press contact:

American Film Institute: Shari Mesulam, [email protected].

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