Julia Roberts wore the most appropriate thing possible to pay tribute to her friend George Clooney at Sunday’s Kennedy Center Honors: a gown with pictures of Clooney’s face all over it.
“I’m here for Gladys Knight,†she joked, referring to the Empress of Soul, also a 2022 Kennedy Center Honoree, after walking onstage. “Can’t you tell?â€
Roberts, who co-starred with Clooney in Ocean’s Eleven, Ocean’s Twelve, Money Monster, and the recent Ticket to Paradise, was obviously there to say some lovely words about the actor, filmmaker, activist, and “everyone’s sixth favorite Batman,†as he was described by another co-star and friend, Matt Damon. “Maybe it is the small-town southern girl in me that responds to the uniquely small-town southern boy in him, but I’ve just always felt that I really see George and he really sees me,†Roberts said. “He’s the best combination of gentleman and playmate.â€
All five of this year’s Kennedy Center Honorees started somewhere small and forged their way toward something bigger and greater. Pulitzer Prize–winning composer and conductor Tania León immigrated from Cuba to the United States at 24 not at all certain that she would be able to build a career in music. “That’s why I’m a CPA as well,†she said on the red carpet prior to the ceremony. “Because just in case.â€
Knight broke into the music business at age 7, when she won a singing competition on The Original Amateur Hour. Amy Grant also started young — she released her first album a month before graduating high school and eventually brought Christian pop into the mainstream. On Sunday night she became the first contemporary Christian artist to become a Kennedy Center Honoree. And then there are the four boys from U2 — Bono, the Edge, Larry Mullen Jr., and Adam Clayton — who started a punk band in high school, when they could barely play their instruments, and went on to become one of the most significant rock artists of the modern era. They are only the fifth band to be honored by the Kennedy Center, following on the heels of the Who, Led Zeppelin, the Eagles, and Earth, Wind & Fire.
Sean Penn called U2 “one of the most poignant and consistently relevant bands in history,†then segued into a video tribute to The Joshua Tree quartet in which Beyoncé, Harry Styles, Billie Eilish, and Finneas spoke the lyrics to some of their best-known songs, “Sunday Bloody Sunday,†“Pride (In the Name of Love)†and “Beautiful Day†among them. The actual musical performances did not highlight any of U2’s pre–Achtung Baby work. Eddie Vedder, backed by a full band, performed a spirited version of “Elevation†from their 2000 album, All That You Can’t Leave Behind. Mary J. Blige had been scheduled to perform “One†but had to bow out at the last minute due to illness, so Vedder handled that one, too, while Brandi Carlile, who also participated in the Grant tribute, joined Hozier and Ukrainian singer Jamala for “Walk On.â€
Weirdly, the most memorable part of the U2 salute may have been the portion handled by Sacha Baron Cohen as Borat, who dropped several sexually tinged jokes aimed at President Biden and Jill Biden — for more on that, read this — who were in attendance along with Vice-President Kamala Harris, First Gentleman Doug Emhoff, and other Washington dignitaries. (That included Nancy Pelosi and her husband, Paul, appearing publicly for the first time since he was attacked in the couple’s San Francisco home.) After reading a message to U2 from the premier of Kazakhstan, Borat translated it into English: “Please remove your wretched album from my iPhone.†He added: “Your band fights oppression around the world: Stop it!†Up in the balcony where the honorees sit next to the president, Bono laughed heartily.
With a majority of the honorees representing music as a discipline, the night was filled with song. Sheryl Crow did Grant’s “Baby, Baby†while BeBe and CeCe Winans delivered a rousing, thoroughly gospel version of “Sing Your Praise to the Lord.†Members of the Dance Theatre of Harlem, for whom León composed music, performed during “Tumbao,†while the Kennedy Center Orchestra captured the intensity of “Stride,†the Susan B. Anthony–inspired piece that won León her Pulitzer last year. The Gladys Knight tribute may have been the most uplifting of the night, with Garth Brooks singing “Midnight Train to Georgia,†Mickey Guyton belting “You’re the Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me,†Ariana DeBose crushing “I Heard It Through the Grapevine,†and the monumental Patti LaBelle professing her love for her Verzuz partner and friend of six decades with “That’s What Friends Are For.â€
Even Clooney’s tribute, which was set in a moody bar where several of his closest friends and family told stories about him, featured jazz artist Dianne Reeves crooning “How High the Moon,†a song she sang in Clooney’s film Good Night, and Good Luck.
Richard Kind, Clooney’s longtime friend and former roommate, talked about the many second-rate movies and failed pilots Clooney starred in before finally emerging as a genuine movie star. Noting that his friend played Ace for one season of The Facts of Life, he said, “One time he went to a commercial audition where the prototype on the casting sheet said ‘Ace in Facts of Life.’ So George went in, he said, ‘I am Ace on Facts of Life.’ He didn’t get the job.â€
Damon talked about how Clooney is viewed as perhaps the last of the classic movie stars, someone whose image evokes other great leading men like Cary Grant, Paul Newman, and Gregory Peck. “And then I think of George, a man who once defecated into Richard Kind’s kitty litter box,†Damon said, “who once stole Bill Clinton’s stationery and wrote fake notes to actors saying how much the president loved their work.†He then showed a high-school picture of Clooney sporting a bowl cut and looking not at all Cary Grant–esque. “Yeah, Amal, that’s George Clooney,†he said, addressing Clooney’s wife, whose hand Clooney reached for often during the evening. “The sexiest man alive, and you married him.â€
Clooney’s father, Nick, went a more moving route, telling a story about his plans to speak about Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination during his news broadcast, which were upended when his young son, in response to the civil-rights leader’s death, emptied a bag full of his toy guns onto a coffee table and said he did not want them anymore. “I tore up my speech,†the elder Clooney said. “Nothing I would have written would have been nearly as eloquent as what George had just done and said. Fifteen years later, George left his Kentucky cottage home and went to California, and he started this astounding career. He has never stopped, from that day to this, surprising me.â€
He also said the one thing he wanted everyone to know about his son is that his “best and most important work is still ahead of him.†That felt true about practically all of the honorees, who were getting their flowers for a lifetime of achievements while those lives were still in progress. As Damon put it during a conversation after the ceremony: “I hate awards shows. But this one’s pretty special.â€
The Kennedy Center Honors will air Wednesday, December 28th on CBS.