40 | DECEMBER 16 • 2021

A “NORMAL” KENNEDY
CENTER HONORS AND A
LAST, MOVING NOTE
The Kennedy Centers
Honors are annually given
to five people in the per-
forming arts for their lifetime
contributions to American
culture. The honorees this
year are Lorne Michaels, 77,
Bette Midler, 76, Motown
Records founder Berry
Gordy, Justino Diaz, a
Puerto Rican opera singer,
and famous singer/songwrit-
er Joni Mitchell.
The Honors are a week-
end-long event that this
year took place Dec. 5-6.
The Honors normally
include a dinner at the
State Department, a pri-
vate reception at the White
House and a Sunday eve-
ning gala public concert at
the Kennedy Center. This
year, the State Department
dinner took place at the
“more airy” Library of
Congress. In welcoming
remarks, Secretary of State
Antony Blinken, 59, noted
the vital role culture can
play in advancing interna-
tional understanding.
As the Washington Post
put it: The most recent
Honors events were a
return to “normalcy.” The
Honors awards began in
1978 and, before 2017, a
sitting president almost
never missed an Honors
event. However, President
Trump chose not to attend
any Honors event during his
term. This wasn’t “normal,”
and “not normal” got much
worse in 2020-21. The 2020
Honors events did not take
place last December, as
they usually do, because of
the pandemic. The 2020

honorees got their awards
in a virtual event that took
place in March 2021.
I mention all this because
the 2021 Honors are
something special, and it’s
worth watching. The Gala
audience, which included
many Republican attendees,
were reportedly “giddy”
as they got to enjoy “real”
live entertainment from
the Kennedy Center stage
(saluting the honorees). The
Post says that the 2,000
people at the Gala show-
ered President Biden with
standing ovations mostly
because he was there —
and except for face masks,
things were “pretty normal”
again.
CBS will broadcast the
Honors Gala concert on
Wednesday, Dec. 22, at 9
p.m. The concert is a four-
hour event that CBS edits
down to two hours. This
year, for the first time, the
CBS Gala footage will also
stream on Paramount+
(formerly CBS All-Access).
I know that CBS never
re-runs their Gala cover-
age or makes it available
on-demand. I don’t believe
it will be on-demand on
Paramount+. Best bet:
Watch live on CBS and, if
you can, DVR record it.

Bette Midler was feted by
Beanie Feldstein, 28, Kate
Baldwin and Taylor Trensch.
They co-starred with Midler
in her hit 2017 Broadway
revival of Hello, Dolly! They
took the Gala concert stage
and sang a Midler favorite,
“You Gotta Have Friends.”
Goldie Hawn, 76, singer
Melissa Manchester, 70,
and Barbara Hershey,
73, told warm anecdotes
about Midler (Manchester’s
parents were Jewish;
Hawn’s mother was Jewish
and Hershey’s father was
Jewish. Hershey co-starred
with Midler in the hit movie
Beaches).
Lorne Michaels, born
Lorne Lipowitz, co-created
Saturday Night Live (SNL) in
1975 and he remains its very
much “hands-on” producer.
Yes, some of his choices
(guest hosts, cast members,
etc.) have been reasonably
criticized. However, to keep
a hit show a hit show for
45 years is an objectively
remarkable record.
At the Gala, a series of
SNL Weekend Update
hosts took the stage. (Kevin
Nealon, Amy Poehler,
Seth Meyers, Colin Jost
and Michael Che). They
appeared in a mock-up
of a television set and, in

the classic SNL way, they
honored Michaels through
barbed comedic comments
about his shortcomings and
quirks.
Opening in theaters on
Dec. 17 is Nightmare Alley.
Alley is a remake of a har-
rowing 1947 film about the
rise and gruesome fall of a
con man. Bradley Cooper
stars as the con man. The
supporting cast includes
Ron Perlman, 71, and Tim
Blake Nelson, 57.
Shortly after Stephen
Sondheim’s death, the
website CinemaBlend pub-
lished a moving piece about
Sondheim’s last communica-
tion with Steven Spielberg,
who directed the new film
version of West Side Story
(Sondheim wrote the lyrics
for the West Side songs.).
After seeing a special pre-
view screening of the new
West Side Story, Sondheim
sent Spielberg a simple
note. Spielberg explained
that he sometimes called
Sondheim ‘SS1’ and
Sondheim sometimes called
Spielberg ‘SS2’ (Think about
their initials for a second).
The note read: “SS2, you
done good buddy boy. —
SS1.”
Spielberg went on to say
that he was heartbroken
and that during the pan-
demic SS1 and SS2 became
great friends. They bonded
over the making of the new
West Side Story and through
their mutual love of older
movies. During the pandem-
ic and quarantine, Spielberg
said, they spent a year-and-
a-half exchanging films with
each other and wrote many
long emails to each other
about the films.

CELEBRITY NEWS

NATE BLOOM COLUMNIST

ARTS&LIFE

Lorne Michaels

ANDERS KRUSBERG / PEABODY AWARDS

Bette Midler

ALAN LIGHT