The
2008 Fred & Adele Astaire Awards recognizing
excellence in dance on both stage and film have
announced that nine time Tony Award & two time Astaire
Award winner Tommy Tune will receive the 2008
Fred & Adele Astaire Lifetime Achievement at the awards
gala slate for June 2, 2008 at the Grand Ballroom,
Manhattan Center Studios, 311 West 34th
Street & 8th Avenue, New York City.
"The Auditory Oral School of New York is thrilled our
prestigious nominating committee chose Tommy Tune to
receive the Lifetime Achievement Award. His
extraordinary career represents the epitome of what Fred
and Adele Astaire worked so hard to achieve. They would
be proud to honor his work and commitment to dance on
Broadway”, said Jennifer Dumas Executive Producer
of the awards .
The
Nominating committee is comprised of: Clive Barnes,
Senior Theater & Dance Critic New York Post; Anna
Kisselgoff, former Chief Dance Critic, New York
Times; Wendy Perron, Editor in Chief, Dance
Magazine; Sylviane Gold, Theater Columnist, Dance
Magazine; Linda Winer, Chief Theater Critic,
Newsday and Jacques D’Amboise, Dancer,
Choreographer, Director & Founder of The National Dance
Institute. Chairman Emeritus of the Nominating Committee
is Douglas Watt, former Senior Drama Critic, New
York Daily News. Award
winners will be announced in May.
Honorary Chairs of the event are Fred Astaire’s daughter
Ava Astaire McKenzie & her husband artist
Richard McKenzie.
The
Nominating Committee for the 2008 Fred & Adele Astaire
Awards is currently reviewing select shows and films for
consideration for the awards to dancers and
choreographers representing the best of Broadway and
film performances and choreography this season. The name
of the award first presented 26 years ago, The Astaire
Award, was changed this year to reflect the original
intent of the awards creators in honoring the famed
brother and sister team. This will be the first such
awards in three years. The award winners will be
announced in May.
The
Fred & Adele Astaire Awards (formerly known as The
Astaire Awards established in 1982 by the Anglo-American
Contemporary Dance Foundation and administered by
Theatre Development Fund since 1991)
recognize outstanding
achievement in dance on Broadway each season. The award
was established with the cooperation of Fred Astaire to
honor him and his sister, Adele, who starred with her
brother in 10 Broadway musicals between 1917 and 1931.
This year the Awards will be expanded to include dance
in and choreography for film as this was the métier that
brought Fred Astaire to international fame and a
permanent slot on every list of the top movie stars of
the century.
The gala evening will begin with cocktails and a seated
dinner followed by electrifying performances and the
Awards presentation. Sponsorship packages are available
at $15,000, $10,000, $5,000 and $3,500. Tickets are $500
(for prime seating) and $350. A limited number of seats
are available at $50 for balcony seating for the awards
and performance and an invitation to stay for dessert
and dancing.
Jennifer Dumas,
Executive Producer for the Auditory Oral School of New
York and Patricia Watt, are producers of this
year’s awards. Proceeds from
the evening will benefit The Auditory Oral School of New
York, a non profit organization which specializes
in teaching deaf and hard of hearing children to listen,
talk, think and socialize.
For tickets and information, contact Jennifer Dumas,
Executive Producer, at 212-655-9377 or
jd@auditoryoral.org
ABOUT TOMMY TUNE
In
2003,
The President of The United States presented Tommy Tune
with the nation’s highest honor for Artistic
Achievement, The National Medal of Arts In a private
ceremony in the oval office of the White House, Mr. Tune
received this honor to add to his already unprecedented
nine Tony Awards in four different categories plus,
among other accolades, eight Drama Desk Awards, two Obie
Awards, two Astaire Awards, the American Dance Award,
the Drama League Award and the George Abbott Award for
Lifetime Achievement.
It was back in 1965 when Tommy Tune first danced onto
the Great White Way and into the chorus of Baker Street.
Next up was A Joyful Noise in 1967 and How Now Dow Jones
in 1968. Five years and countless raves later Tommy
garnered his first Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in
a Musical in Michael Bennett's Seesaw.
Tune's first foray into directing was the groundbreaking
Off-Broadway hit The Club in 1976. Back on Broadway, but
this time as choreographer and co-director Tune gave us
The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas followed by A Day in
Hollywood/A Night in the Ukraine, for which he won his
second Tony Award, this time for Best Choreography.
Tommy returned to Off-Broadway in 1981 to direct the
highly controversial production of Caryl Churchill’s
Cloud 9. The next year Tommy brought us Nine, The
Musical for which he won his third Tony, and his first
for directing a Broadway Musical.
A double Tony Award win followed for Mr. Tune as Best
Actor in a Musical and Best Choreography for the
Broadway hit My One and Only co-starring Twiggy.
Grand Hotel, The Musical followed with Tony wins for
Best Choreography and Best Direction and the following
year Mr. Tune did what no artist had done before when he
won the same two prestigious honors back to back this
time for The Will Rogers Follies.
Tommy once again returned to the other side of the
Broadway footlights in his one-man song and dance show,
Tommy Tune Tonight!, later touring with it throughout
the country and around the world.
Of his unique talents as a director, choreographer,
singer, dancer and actor, the New York Times proclaimed,
“Mr. Tune has reshuffled the elements of the old-style
musical into state of the art.” Andy Warhol once
said that Tommy Tune “exudes a cultivated serenity and a
genuine love of life.”
Tommy has shied away from Hollywood moviemaking,
appearing in only two films early in his illustrious
career. He was featured in Hello, Dolly! starring
Barbra Streisand and directed by Gene Kelly,
and in Ken Russell's The Boy Friend where he first met
Twiggy.
Tune has sung and danced for three U.S. Presidents, the
Queen of England and the Royal Family of Monaco. In
1991, Gwen Verdon inducted him into Broadway's
Theatre Hall of Fame, and Hollywood soon followed suit
when three years later he was honored with his own star
on the Hollywood Walk of Fame appropriately placed
directly in front of the Capezio Dancewear shop.
In 1997 Tommy gave us Footnotes, his memoir about his
extraordinary life in the theatre, and Slow Dancin’, a
CD compilation of his favorite romantic ballads. The end
of the millennium was the beginning of a dream come true
for Tommy Tune when he made his Las Vegas debut as the
star of EFX, the ninety million dollar spectacular at
the MGM Grand Hotel.
When he’s not drawing crowds, Mr. Tune is painting
canvases in his Manhattan studio. Not content to
entertain audiences on land alone, Tommy has recently
created an elaborate musical entitled Paparazzi for the
Holland America Line. Mr. Tune's latest production, Dr.
Doolittle, in which he played the title role, toured the
country in 2006. He is currently preparing two original
musicals for the near future.