The annual feel-good event is completely non-partisan and non-political, and hopes are always that the current situation will allow the President to attend. People arrive from all over the world, and the activities begin on the first day (Saturday) with lunch at the Kennedy Center, a chance for old friends to meet, and a welcoming speech by the President of the Board of Trustees. The afternoon is time to rest and prepare for the evening reception and dinner at the State Department, presided over by the Secretary of State, where the year's Honorees are introduced, with commentary by notable friends.
On the next day, Sunday, a few leisurely cocktail parties are held around town, rest, and a sprucing up for the early evening White House reception where the honorees will be introduced in the East Room by the President of the United States, who will then hang a specially designed ribboned award around their necks. Notable is the fact that at no time is the recipient permitted to speak, difficult for their usually expressive personalities. Everyone is then bussed to the nearby Kennedy Center, ready for the show to begin.
The Honorees sit in a row at the front of the Box Tier, a few seats away from the President and the First Family. The show consists of carefully selected events from the recipients' lives, presented documentary style in film and live onstage, the idea being to surprise them with what they are about to see. Afterwards, a late supper dance in the theatre's Grand Foyer, ending finally around dawn, and farewells until next year.
List of recipients of the Kennedy Center Honors 1978 — Marian Anderson, Fred Astaire, George Balanchine, Richard Rodgers and Arthur Rubinstein 1979 — Aaron Copland, Ella Fitzgerald, Henry Fonda, Martha Graham and Tennessee Williams 1980 — Leonard Bernstein, James Cagney, Agnes de Mille, Lynn Fontanne and Leontyne Price 1981 — Count Basie, Cary Grant, Helen Hayes, Jerome Robbins and Rudolf Serkin 1982 — George Abbott, Lillian Gish, Benny Goodman, Gene Kelly and Eugene Ormandy 1983 — Katherine Dunham, Elia Kazan, Frank Sinatra, James Stewart and Virgil Thomson 1984 — Lena Horne, Danny Kaye, Gian Carlo Menotti, Arthur Miller and Isaac Stern 1985 — Merce Cunningham, Irene Dunne, Bob Hope, Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe and Beverly Sills 1986 — Lucille Ball, Hume Cronyn, Jessica Tandy, Yehudi Menuhin, Antony Tudor and Ray Charles 1987 — Perry Como, Bette Davis, Sammy Davis Jr, Nathan Milstein and Alwin Nikolais The annual feel-good event is completely non-partisan and non-political, and hopes are always that the current situation will allow the President to attend.
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