President Donald Trump has announced this year’s Kennedy Center honours will go to action star Sylvester Stallone, stage actor Michael Crawford, singers George Strait and Gloria Gaynor, and the rock band KISS.
Breaking with tradition, he will also host the show later this year, celebrating the recipients of one of the country’s highest recognitions of artists.
After returning to office, Trump fired the president and much of the board of the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and took on the role of its chairman, a move many criticised as political interference in the arts.
He said on Wednesday he plans to fully renovate the centre, which receives federal funds for its facilities.
Trump said he was “98% involved” in the selection of this year’s honourees, adding “I was very involved”.
During Wednesday’s event, where two women in evening gowns pulled away fabric draped over portraits to reveal each honoured artist, Trump said he had rejected prospective honourees who were “wokesters”.
Trump also criticised the Academy Awards and other arts recognitions for being “too woke”. He has frequently taken aim at “wokeness” – which he portrays as being excessively orthodox about liberal and progressive ideas – since returning to office.
He acknowledged that some selected artists had turned down the award, as well, a nod to the discontent over his leading the 54 year-old centre .
Stallone, who last appeared in the movie Alarum this winter, is a strong Trump supporter, and has extolled him as the “second George Washington”.
“Nobody in the world could have pulled off what he pulled off, so I’m in awe,” Stallone said of the president’s November election victory.
Meanwhile, the lead singer of KISS, Gene Simmons, has been critical of Trump in the past.
“I don’t think he’s a Republican or a Democrat,” Simmons said of Trump in 2022. “He’s out for himself, any way you can get there. And in the last election, over 70 million people bought it hook, line and sinker.”
Trump on Wednesday pledged, as chairman, to make the Kennedy Center a “crown jewel” of arts and culture in time for the 2026 celebrations of America’s 250th anniversary. He spoke at length about repairing seats and updating the building that looks over the Potomac River.
After Trump ousted board members and staff earlier this year, many performers canceled upcoming engagements at the centre, including the producers of Broadway hit Hamilton, who said in a statement: “We cannot presently support an institution that has been forced by external forces to betray its mission as a natural cultural center that fosters the free expression of art.”
As the US moves closer to its 250th birthday, Trump is showing increasing interest in many aspects of its capital city, including bolstering its law enforcement to address what he describes as an emergency with crime.
His administration on Tuesday announced it will review current and planned exhibitions at the Smithsonian Institution, whose museums line the National Mall. The review will examine websites, social media and museum text “to assess tone, historical framing and alignment with American ideals”.
The Smithsonian will have 120 days to address problems identified in the review.
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