The Cinematic Life Achievement Triple Crown

This past week two screen legends received news that their already extensive awards hardware collection would be adding some great new baubles.  Tom Hanks will be winning this year's Cecil B. DeMille Award from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (given out at the Golden Globes), while Dame Julie Andrews will take the AFI Life Achievement Award.  While Andrews win is a bit unexpected (we spent a long time profiling contenders, but only had her as an Honorable Mention since the AFI is stingy when it comes to giving trophies to non-American stars, even if they're of Andrews' fame & caliber), it's hard to imagine how Hanks avoided winning the DeMille through the years, as he's been nominated for 9 Golden Globes and won four (for Big, Philadelphia, Forrest Gump, and Cast Away).  Hanks' victory, though, gives us the newest member of one of my favorite blog pet projects: the Cinematic Life Achievement Triple Crown.

The Cinematic Life Achievement Triple Crown (which is a term I use here but almost no one else does, unless this blog's reach is further than I anticipated) is a term I bestow on someone who has won the Cecil B. DeMille Award, the AFI Life Achievement Award, and the Kennedy Center Honor.  These are arguably the three highest honors for life achievement in the cinematic community, and so I lump them together. One could make an argument that the Honorary Oscar should qualify, but that typically goes to people who haven't won competitive trophies, so it's a weirder list, and the SAG Life Achievement Award (which should be announced in the next week or so) skews to both film & TV, rather than being predominantly cinematic, and seems to be a little more inclined to political actors or actors with a humanitarian streak (think someone like Betty White or last year's recipient Alan Alda).  As a result, I group the DeMille/AFI/Kennedy together, and with his victory this year, Hanks has taken all three.

We haven't checked in on the status of who is getting close to completing the Triple Crown in a few years, so I figured with Hanks & Andrews starting to round the bases this year, it was time to re-investigate.  It's worth noting that frequently if you win one of these awards, you'll win most of them.  Hanks is one of fifteen living winners who has taken all three trophies.  Considering this goes out once a year (and with the exception of the Kennedy Center Honors, there's only one victor a year), it says something about how monotonous the awards' bodies get that there are actually 15 victors of all three awards still around.  Below you'll find a look at all of the names that are headed toward the Triple Crown (and a sampling of the legends who haven't started yet).

Living Triple Crown Winners: Tom Hanks is just one of a number of living Lifetime Achievement Award Winners.  As I mentioned above, if you're going to start this journey, it's likely you're going to finish it if you live long enough, since film only has so many legends.  The other fourteen living victors of all three are Kirk Douglas, Sidney Poitier, Jack Nicholson, Clint Eastwood, Martin Scorsese, Dustin Hoffman, Barbra Streisand, Robert de Niro, Meryl Streep, Sean Connery, Al Pacino, Warren Beatty, Morgan Freeman, and Shirley MacLaine.

Minus DeMille: Julie Andrews was an early victor for the Kennedy Center Honors, which are less shy about giving trophies to non-Americans than the AFI (it's in the name), and also likely due to Andrews' work on stage & television, as the Kennedy Center Honors go with people who are in the performing arts, not focused solely on film (like the other two trophies).  That said, one wonders if she could pull off the DeMille at some point considering her solid history with the Globes (14 nods, 5 wins).  Other figures that have won both the Kennedy Center Honor and the AFI include men who are behind-the-scenes (might not be as inclined for a trophy at the star-loving Globes as even Spielberg & Scorsese had to wait a while to win here): John Williams, Mel Brooks, and George Lucas.  Perhaps the most likely person after Andrews could be Steve Martin, who'd give a brilliant speech & has five Globe nominations but no trophies yet.  If he's going to win the AFI with his comparatively thin filmography (certainly compared to some of the people we listed as current Triple Crown Winners above), you'd think the Globes would be fine going for him.

Minus Kennedy: The Kennedy Center Honors can usually pick 1-2 film figures, though it seems slightly less-inclined to "popular" movie stars than DeMille or AFI, and more likely to make them wait a bit for the trophy.  This might be why this is the missing leg for the likes of Harrison Ford & George Clooney, though in the latter's case it seems it could be that his politics might be untenable in the era of Trump (it's probable that Trump doesn't have a lot of say in who is picked considering some of his sharpest critics like Cher & Norman Lear have won during his presidency, but you can never tell) or at 58 he's just too young.  Denzel Washington seems almost certain to take the Kennedy Center Honor at some point, though I wonder if the ship might have sailed for Michael Douglas, who has both of the other awards but is routinely beaten for the Kennedy Center.  His father won it, but that was years ago and the younger Douglas's fame has started to deplete in recent years with neither he nor his wife making films (focusing more on television).  I could still see him making it, but it's odd that they haven't taken the opportunity already.

Minus AFI: There are now just two living people who have won the Kennedy Center & the DeMille but not taken the AFI.  This is always the shortest list, which is weird because the AFI feels like it's the hardest to come by (since not as many people win the Kennedy Center & the DeMille has been around longer).  The first of these two is beyond a mystery to me.  We detailed this in my link above for the AFI, but how Robert Redford didn't take this award in the past decade considering his work as a multi-hyphenate movie star/filmmaker, as well as the founder of the Sundance Film Festival, is so odd.  The mystery of how Redford has avoided this honor is one of those random "awards season enigmas" I ponder from time-to-time.  The only other person who is in this same camp is Oprah Winfrey.  Winfrey's win at the DeMille's happened before the launch of the Carol Burnett Award (focused more on TV than film) and one wonders if she would have won the DeMille had the Burnett Award already existed, since Winfrey's biggest contributions have been in television.  I suspect, even with her moving into film at a more aggressive clip with movies like A Wrinkle in Time and Selma in recent years that Winfrey won't be able to take the AFI at any point in the future with such a thin cinematic resume.

Kennedy Only: We now move to people who have only won one leg of the awards, and it's a good reminder that the Kennedy Center Honors pick recipients based on not just film (like the Globes & AFI), but all of their contributions to the performing arts.  This means that there are figures like Cher, Rita Moreno, Angela Lansbury, Lily Tomlin, Cicely Tyson, & James Earl Jones who definitely have a cinematic background and could conceivably win one of the other two awards, but are more associated with TV, music, and/or the stage & simply don't have the credentials to win the AFI or the DeMille.  Really there's just two people who have the Kennedy whom one would indisputably associate with the movies: Joanne Woodward & Sally Field.  Woodward won the same year as her famed husband Paul Newman (who like his Butch Cassidy costar won the Kennedy & DeMille but never picked up the AFI), but her ill health likely precludes her from taking any other trophies (she supposedly suffers from Alzheimer's Disease).  Field, on the other hand, seems a probable contender in the future for the AFI or DeMille, as she's still very active in cinema and has enough popular hits to make it for either award.

DeMille Only: Looking at the DeMille Award winners who never caught on with the other two bodies, I'm seeing names that could definitely translate to the Kennedy or AFI, but I wonder how many actually will.  Gene Hackman has completely retired from cinema and public life, and as a result it's doubtful that they ever go for him again (perhaps, like Doris Day, he's refused such an honor or doesn't want to go out and get the trophy).  Woody Allen's filmography certainly warrants at least the AFI, but his personal problems pretty much guarantee he'll never win an award like this again.  Sophia Loren is a living legend, but her most important film work is in a different language, and that hurts her chances, particularly with the AFI.  The best bets to get another of the trophies would be Anthony Hopkins, Jeff Bridges, and Jodie Foster, all of whom work still in mainstream projects and have rounded-enough filmographies for the other awards (Hopkins won his DeMille 13 years ago, so it's odd he hasn't taken the other prizes yet as they don't usually make you wait so long, but Foster & Bridges both won their DeMille's relatively recently and could easily grab the next leg of their Crown soon).

AFI Only: Since the AFI is the hardest award of these to win, it's odd that there are two living women who have won the trophy but no other leg in their Triple Crown.  Well, one of the two is odd-it makes total sense that Jane Fonda hasn't taken the Kennedy Center Honor considering there are still pockets of the American populace who loathe her for her political activism in Vietnam (perhaps NBC is raising the flag on not wanting Fonda to have a broadcast TV platform at the Globes...one has to wonder).  Diane Keaton, on the other hand, has also taken the AFI but no other trophies.  She gave the speech at the Globes for her friend Woody Allen when he won the DeMille (but in typical Woody fashion refused to accept it)-perhaps they assume she's already won as a result, but she at least deserves to take the Kennedy Center Honor at some point.

Not Yet Started: Of course, as Sally Field proved this year, there are always going to be people starting their journey for the Cinematic Life Achievement Triple Crown Award.  Field's actually relatively old to be starting to sweep these awards-actors like George Clooney & Jodie Foster have recently made a play for the awards in their fifties.  While not all of these people will make it to even one of these awards, here's a sampling of some of the living film legends who could be contenders for future honors (in case these bodies need any ideas) as well as their ages: Brad Pitt (55), Goldie Hawn (73), Robert Duvall (88), Spike Lee (62), Michael Caine (86), Will Smith (51), Ron Howard (65), Eva Marie Saint (95), Glenn Close (72), Jessica Lange (70), Samuel L. Jackson (70), Tom Cruise (57), Julie Christie (79), Maggie Smith (84), Faye Dunaway (78), Ian McKellen (80), Judi Dench (84), Ellen Burstyn (86), Bette Midler (73), Christopher Plummer (89), Helen Mirren (74), Catherine Deneuve (75), Angela Bassett (61), Sandra Bullock (55), Sissy Spacek (69), Vanessa Redgrave (82), Kathy Bates (71), Norman Jewison (93), Ridley Scott (81), Liza Minnelli (73), Sylvester Stallone (73), Annette Bening (61), James Cameron (65), Daniel Day-Lewis (62), Whoopi Goldberg (63), Holly Hunter (61), Kim Novak (86), Emma Thompson (60), and Michelle Pfeiffer (61).