THE 32nd AFI LIFE ACHIEVEMENT AWARD: A TRIBUTE TO MERYL STREEP
aired on USA Network on Monday, June 21, 2004, at 9:00 p.m.
by Myla Kent

Last Thursday night I was honored to get to attend AFI's 32nd Life Achievement Award ceremony at the beautiful Kodak Theatre in Hollywood with my dear friend Dave, who accompanied me to L.A. from Seattle. I can't even begin to describe what a magical night it was (although I'm going to try), however, before I go on to tell you about it, I have several people to thank.

Meryl, thank you so much. For your grace, your warmth and your ability to make me feel so loved. It is such a great honor to do MSO for you and I'm so thrilled that I was able to be there that night to witness such a deserved outpouring of love, affection and admiration.

Brian Lee. You are without a doubt *the best* and I can't ever thank you enough for making this night possible for me. Thank you, Monique, for everything. To Kevin Huvane and the lovely people at Creative Artists Agency (and everyone at our table), it was a great pleasure to meet you all and thank you so much for making this a night to remember. Todd and Joe (and everyone at AFI) you worked so hard that evening, thank you for taking such good care of us.

And so, you might be wondering, what was the rest of the night like? In a word: surreal. I know that I'm forgetting so much -- not on purpose mind you, but attending an event like this is sort of overwhelming. While waiting for everyone to arrive at the cocktail party, I met a lovely couple from New York, Harvey and Barbara Baren, who were so gracious and fun. The lights flickered, signaling us to go into the main ballroom. There I met a lovely woman and her husband who were sitting at the next table: Dey Young is a fabulous actress who you'll probably remember as the snobby saleswoman who threw Julia Roberts out of the Beverly Hills boutique in Pretty Woman and, who, as it turns out, is also a fabulous sculptress. As we looked around the room, we saw more and more familiar faces: Clint Eastwood, Robert DeNiro, Shirley MacLaine, Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn, Kevin Kline, Carrie Fisher, the list goes on and on (and on).

And then . . . Meryl made her entrance. She came out on stage with her camera, photographing everyone in the star-studded audience and curtseyed all. the. way. down. to. the. floor. (in her stunningly beautiful Isaac Mizrahi gown) to a standing ovation. After she took her seat, Sir Howard Stringer and Jean Picker Firstenberg opened the event with insightful and interesting speeches about AFI (it's past, present and future), and Meryl Streep (of course!). Director Patty Jenkins was the other honoree of the evening, Charlize Theron presented her with AFI's 14th Annual Franklin J. Schaffner Alumni Medal, both of them seemed so honored to be there that night and cited Meryl as an inspiration to their craft.

Jim Carrey was the first of Meryl's co-stars who gave a touching (and hilariously funny) speech about how he sort of 'taught Meryl the ropes' while working on Lemony Snicket. You can read what he said here. And then the program began. For me, one of the program highlights was the on-screen interview with Meryl -- doing her own voice work =) narrating as rare, never-before-seen movie clips from her childhood through high school years were shown. . . together with a beautiful sort of compilation of rare images of Meryl in various stages of her career . . . it was beautifully composed and incredibly special to watch.

Throughout the evening, clips from Meryl's films were shown and paired with the film's co-stars who were there to honor her. One of the first was James Woods, who starred with Meryl in the miniseries Holocaust. He told a wonderful story about working with Meryl in Germany during the shoot, and gave tribute to the man Meryl has called her linchpin, her husband, the artist Don Gummer. One by one the stars came out, to tell their personal recollections describing what it was like to work with Meryl, some with touching tributes, some just downright funny: Kevin Kline, Shirley MacLaine, Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn, Diane Keaton, Nora Ephron, Clint Eastwood, Robert DeNiro, Jack Nicholson and many, many others. Robert Redford, Mike Nichols, Cher, Nicole Kidman, Julianne Moore, Mary Louise Parker and others reminisced on screen; and there were many other fun surprises that evening.

When it was time for Meryl to accept the award, she gave, as you would expect, a touching and clever speech, I am not going to spoil it by giving away what she talked about here but I will say that it was fantastic, as always, and at some point we'll reprint it here on MSO. At the end of the evening, we gathered at a party for Meryl afterward where I took the photograph above, and I had the great pleasure of meeting members of Meryl's family, the sublime and awfully sweet Kevin Kline, the awesome Roy Helland; Mike Nichols (the director) and the fabulous Tracey Ullman.

It was a remarkable evening, for a remarkable person. And it was a night I'll always remember.