Actress and comedienne Lilly Tomlin will receive AARP The Magazine’s Movies for Grownups Awards Career Achievement Honor when 2021’s Best Movies and TV for Grownups Awards are presented during the 20th Anniversary Special on March 18 from Great Performances on PBS.
For two decades, AARP’s Movies for Grownups program has championed movies for grownups, by grownups, by advocating for the 50-plus audience, fighting industry ageism and encouraging films — and now TV shows — that resonate with older viewers.
“I am honored to receive this award from AARP,” Tomlin said in a statement. “There are so few grownups in the world. I am happy to be one. I feel I am not only a grownup, but I am mature for my age and that’s the truthhhhh!”
Tomlin will receive Movies for Grownups’ highest honor at the virtual awards ceremony, which will also include recognition for 2021’s best films and television series, including best actor, best actress, best director, best picture/best movie for grownups, best series, best TV movie/limited series, and more.
She joins a prestigious list of previous AARP Movies for Grownups Career Achievement honorees, including George Clooney, Annette Bening, Kevin Costner, Robert De Niro, Michael Douglas, Morgan Freeman, Shirley MacLaine, Helen Mirren, Robert Redford, Susan Sarandon and Sharon Stone.
Lily Tomlin, one of America’s foremost actresses, has conquered a wide range of media, starring in television, theater, motion pictures, animation, video and social media. Throughout her extraordinary career, Tomlin has received numerous awards, including eight Emmys, with 25 Primetime and five Daytime nominations over 50 years; a Tony for her one-woman Broadway show, Appearing Nitely; a second Tony for best actress, a Drama Desk Award and an Outer Critics Circle Award for her one-woman performance in Jane Wagner’s The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe; a CableACE Award for executive producing the film adaptation of The Search; a Grammy for her comedy album, This is a Recording, and nominations for her albums Modern Scream, And That’s the Truth, and On Stage; and two Peabody Awards, for Edith Ann’s Christmas (Just Say Noël), and The Celluloid Closet. She earned a 1976 Oscar nomination for Nashville, plus the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor in 2003. In 2014, she received the Kennedy Center Honors in Washington, DC., followed by a SAG Lifetime Achievement Award in 2017.
