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When Dionne Warwick told her sons that she had been selected as a Kennedy Center honoree, “not only were they very excited, but my eldest said, ‘Well, Mom, it’s about time.'”
“Everything happens when it’s supposed to, that’s my attitude,” Warwick said, laughing. “So I’m thrilled they finally got it right!”
Warwick, 82, was refers to the Kennedy Center’s 45-year tradition of honoring artists who “have had an impact on the rich fabric of American life and culture through the performing arts.”
Also in the 46th class of honorees are actor and comedian Billy Crystal, opera star Renée Fleming, Bee Gees singer and songwriter Barry Gibb, and hip-hop pioneer and actress Queen Latifah, the arts center announced Thursday.
“It’s a beautiful thing,” Crystal said. “It’s very special because it’s not a competition. It’s an appreciation.”
“It’s quite an impressive night in America for American art,” Latifah said. “Being part of that is very profound.”
The December 3 ceremony at the 2,364-seat Opera House will be moderated by former award winner Gloria Estefan while also celebrating hip-hop’s 50th anniversary. A group of celebrity guests, who will remain top secret until the evening, will take the stage to celebrate the award winners. The show will later air on CBS and stream on Paramount Plus.
“I think it’s kind of fun to celebrate hip-hop and at the same time celebrate a man who made disco and pop music so ubiquitous,” Kennedy Center President Deborah F. Rutter said, referring to Gibb. “To have three women who are so strong, who have remade themselves in so many different ways and to have had such exceptional careers is also central to that.”
Every award winner in 46th grade is a multi-multi hyphenator (if not a multi-multi-multi hyphenator). Crystal writes, directs and acts. Fleming sings, but is also committed to research at the intersection of art, health and neuroscience. Queen Latifah dominated both radio and screen.
“These are artists who didn’t just do one thing, but re-created themselves,” Rutter said. “That’s what a true artist is to me: constantly discovering new art, trying to grow, making the world a better place through your art, and I think that’s really true of these five.”
“It’s one of the awards we’ve been striving for for many years,” Warwick said. So of course she’s thrilled that “they’ve finally honored a body of work from the last 60 years.”
This work has more than 100 million records sold and 60 chart hits – including 19 consecutive Top 100 singles with songwriters Burt Bacharach and Hal David. She has used her music to fuel her engagement, such as the first recording devoted to AIDS awareness – the 1985 No. 1 hit “That’s What Friends Are For” starring Gladys Knight, Elton John and Stevie Wonder.
Recently, Warwick has entered a new generation as a popular Twitter personality and Saturday Night Live character. After all, she had a surprise appearance on this show.
Now Warwick is ready for her moment on the Opera House balcony. But she added, “With that comes a little bit of sadness as well because both Burt and Hal are no longer with us to enjoy this with me.” But you know, they’re looking down smiling, I’m sure. “
Billy Crystal, 75, was left speechless when he learned of the honor, an unusual state for the lifelong entertainer. “I was just totally, totally shocked, I have to say. Immediately very emotional about it. I’m not a man of words, but I only had a few words. Which was “Really?” Wow. Are you sure it’s not Bill Kristol, the Republican?’” he joked.
“I’ve been entertaining almost my entire life,” Crystal added. “And I immediately thought about how quickly that happened.”
Crystal’s love of entertainment grew out of trying to make his parents laugh at their Long Island home when he was five. He eventually began a career with a stint on SNL, as an acclaimed awards host, stand-up comedian, and star of comedies like City Slickers and When Harry Met Sally….
He went on to write and direct films, wrote five books, appeared on Broadway stages, won Emmy and Tony awards, and received the Kennedy Center’s other major honor, the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor in 2007.
“It was just all just a wonderful life, in all walks of life and different places of entertaining, caring for people and trying to do the right thing,” Crystal said soulfully.
The hardest part about the honor, though, was knowing he was the honoree for six weeks but only being able to tell Janice, his wife of 53 years. (He broke down on Father’s Day and told his daughters, but let’s keep that to ourselves. “I couldn’t help it,” he said.)
Barry Gibb, 76, also described being speechless when he heard the news. “You don’t expect that at this stage of life,” he said, describing his feelings as “stunned, proud and honored.”
Ranked by Guinness World Records as one of the top two most successful songwriters in pop history (the other being Paul McCartney), It’s no surprise that Gibb has appeared as an award winner alongside music legends such as Herbie Hancock, Buddy Guy, Bruce Springsteen and McCartney himself. He has won nine Grammy Awards, been inducted into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and was knighted in his native England.
Gibb has written songs for everyone from Frankie Valli to Diana Ross to fellow award winner Dionne Warwick, but he is best known for being a member of the Bee Gees alongside his brothers Robin and Maurice.
“I think if the three of us had been there today, we would have been three,” Gibb said. “Maybe all four,” he added, referring to his younger brother Andy, who was a solo artist. Gibb is the last surviving brother.
The group, known for hits like “Stayin’ Alive” and “To Love Somebody,” have sold more than 220 million records and topped the US and UK charts 21 times.
“How did we do all this?” Gibb joked. “That sounds exhausting!”
Queen Latifah, 53, thought she might be a bit young to be named a Kennedy Center honoree, but then she thought her first album came out when she was 19. “I think I started pretty young,” she says. So maybe it’s just in time.
Or maybe a little late. Latifah said she wishes her mother, who died in 2018, could witness it.
“My [creative] Partner Shakim was the one who told me and he was one of my mother’s students,” Latifah said. We’ve been together my entire professional life, so he had a little tears in his eyes too, saying, “I wish your mom could be here to see that.” “It’s a really, really proud moment for us to see that all the things we started as teenagers have paid off in such amazing ways.”
Since that first record, Latifah has won Emmy and Grammy awards and been nominated for an Oscar. Not only did she dominate the airwaves as hip-hop’s first lady, but she’s also built an impressive acting career with roles in films as diverse as ‘Jungle Fever’ and ‘Chicago’, as well as the television show ‘The Equalizer.’
“Thank god for hip-hop,” she said. “It’s hip-hop music that opened the door for me to do everything I’ve done. I am really thankful for this art form that we have developed and that has allowed us to move and move around the world.”
Opera star Renée Fleming, 64, has sung with almost everyone almost everywhere. Awarding the Nobel Peace Prize? Check over. Buckingham Palace for Queen Elizabeth II? Check over. At the Super Bowl? Check over. With Luciano Pavarotti? Or Elton John? Or Andrea Bocelli? Or Sting? Or Joan Baez? Check over. Check over. Check over. Check over. Check over.
That could be why the soprano has been named an Arts and Health Ambassador for the World Health Organization, or has received five Grammys, the US National Medal of Arts, the World Economic Forum’s 2023 Crystal Award, the Fulbright Lifetime Achievement Medal, and honorary doctorates from eight universities. The list goes on, but we don’t have the lung capacity of Fleming.
Still, she was surprised to receive Rutter’s call as she was driving home from Lowe’s. “I said, ‘I’ll run errands,'” Fleming recalls. “She just burst out laughing and said, ‘I love it when I make this call and someone runs errands.'”
Fleming was surprised because she’s a consultant at the Kennedy Center and has performed there more than two dozen times, including the 2004 honors ceremony, and thought that might shut her out. But Fleming is glad that wasn’t the case and says she is “incredibly excited” to receive the honor.
Maybe even more since she knows the Kennedy Center so well. “It doesn’t take away from the thrill,” she said. “I think that adds to it because I know what an incredible honor it is.”