Jamie Lee Curtis to be honored at AARP The Magazine’s 21st Movies for Grownups Awards
Jamie Lee Curtis [Andrew Eccles photo]
An acclaimed film and television actor, two-time Golden Globe winner and Emmy nominee, Curtis will receive the award at the 21st annual Movies for Grownups Awards Jan. 28 in Beverly Hills, California.
“Jamie Lee Curtis’ longstanding, ever-increasing career shatters Hollywood’s outmoded stereotypes about aging, and it exemplifies what AARP’s Movies for Grownups program is all about,” said AARP CEO Jo Ann Jenkins in a statement.
“We are delighted to honor Curtis, who at 19 became an iconic ‘scream queen’ in ‘Halloween,’ then grew up to be a master in comic and dramatic roles, too. She soars higher than ever this year, with her last ‘Halloween’ movie and ‘Everything Everywhere All at Once,’ which may well earn her her first Oscar nomination at 64 — on top of the Movies for Grownups Career Achievement Award, our highest honor.”
For more than two decades, AARP’s Movies for Grownups program has championed movies for grownups, by grownups, by advocating for the 50-plus audience, fighting industry ageism, and encouraging films and TV shows that resonate with older viewers, according to a news release.
Curtis will receive Movies for Grownups’ top honor at the awards ceremony, which also will recognize 2022’s best films and television, including best actor, best actress, best director, best picture/best movie for grownups, best TV series, best limited series/TV movie, and more.
Along with receiving the Career Achievement Award, Curtis is nominated in the Movies for Grownups best supporting actress category for her performance in the Daniels’ mind-bending critically acclaimed hit “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” which has become A24’s highest grossing film.
The other nominees for best supporting actress are Angela Bassett for “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” Patricia Clarkson for “She Said,” Judith Ivey for “Women Talking” and Gabrielle Union for “The Inspection.”
“Everything Everywhere All at Once” is nominated in the Best Picture/Best Movie for Grownups category alongside “Elvis,” “The Fabelmans,” “Tár,” “Top Gun: Maverick,” “The Woman King” and “Women Talking.” Plus, Curtis’ “Everything Everywhere All at Once” co-stars Michelle Yeoh and Ke Huy Quan are nominated for best actress and best supporting actor, respectively.
An actor, producer, best-selling author and activist, Curtis’ performance in the 1978 smash “Halloween” launched her as a horror star, planting her in the footsteps of her mother, “Psycho” star Janet Leigh.
Curtis went on to become an action star in James Cameron’s “True Lies,” a brilliant comedienne opposite John Cleese and Kevin Kline in “A Fish Called Wanda” and Lindsay Lohan in “Freaky Friday,” a sitcom lead in “Anything but Love,” and a star who helped launch a hit murder mystery franchise in Rian Johnson’s “Knives Out.”
She has won a British Academy Film Award and a People’s Choice Award and received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In 2021, she was honored with the Golden Lion Career Honorary Award at the 78th Venice International Film Festival.
Curtis also is the author of 13 best-selling children’s books that address core childhood subjects and life lessons in a playful, accessible way. She is the founder and CEO of the website My Hand in Yours, which is a charitable organization that offers comfort and celebration items, with 100 percent of every sale being donated directly to Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, an organization Curtis has been associated with for a long time.
She earned $8,000 for her first film; so far, her movies have earned $2.5 billion.
Curtis was surprised when her 2018 sequel to “Halloween” earned more than a quarter-billion dollars, proving the power of a grownup actress and the clout of her grownup moviegoing fans.
“It broke the box office,” she told AARP, “and it starred a woman over 50. I was, like, ‘Wait, what?’ I didn’t see that coming.”
The lesson of her success: “Look at what age you are. Laugh about it a little. And then shut up and do something! So that’s where I’m at in my life right now.”
Curtis joins a prestigious list of previous AARP Movies for Grownups Career Achievement honorees that includes Lily Tomlin, George Clooney, Annette Bening, Kevin Costner, Robert De Niro, Michael Douglas, Morgan Freeman, Shirley MacLaine, Helen Mirren, Robert Redford, Susan Sarandon and Sharon Stone.
“The iconic talents we honor this year drive a cultural change in the way aging Americans are perceived and valued,” said AARP film and TV critic Tim Appelo in a statement. “They inspire us to think about life differently. And we’re thrilled that the Movies for Grownups Awards are back as a live event, celebrating a profusion of grownup masterworks we could scarcely have imagined when we started the awards decades ago.”
Esteemed screen and stage performer Alan Cumming will return as host of AARP The Magazine’s Movies for Grownups Awards, which will be broadcast nationwide by “Great Performances” Feb. 17 on PBS, at pbs.org/moviesforgrownups and on the PBS Video app.
-BAM
explore: AARP The Magazine | Everything Everywhere All at Once | Jamie Lee Curtis | lifetime achievement award | Movies for GrownupsWelcome to The Week In Women, an AWFJ Network Blog authored by Brandy McDonnell
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