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Updated: November 17, 2009, 9:37 am	Share    Print    Email

Ron Howard, Sir Howard Stringer, Sheila Nevins, Richard L. Plepler, Kristen Johnston, Spike Lee and Brian Grazer at 2009 Tisch School Of The Arts Annual Gala. Photos by Douglas Harrington

New York City - Illuminated by the hundreds of headlights per minute curving around Columbus Circle and the street lights of upper Broadway intersecting the awnings of Manhattan's classiest apartment addresses on Central Park West, the real dazzling illumination was not taking place outside the Time Warner Building on 60th Street, but inside at Fredrick P. Rose Hall. The home of Jazz at Lincoln Center was the venue for the Tisch School of the Arts annual gala and the press and paparazzi were firing away with reckless abandon as the stars of stage, screen and television appeared in support of this extraordinary and influential breeding ground of American artistic success stories. The gala raised vital funds to recruit, enroll, and train the most talented young artists from around the world, regardless of their ability to pay.

Honoree Ron Howard and presenter Spike Lee at the Tisch School for the Arts Annual Gala.

In the genre of television alone, Tisch alumni have garnered 75 Emmy Awards since the school's founding just over 40 years ago, a point that was driven home as the centerpiece of the gala held on Monday, November 2, just a few blocks south of Lincoln Center. Beyond Emmys, Tisch alumni have won 20 Academy Awards, 23 Tony Awards, 15 Golden Globes, 17 Writers Guild Awards, 15 Directors Guild Awards and three Pulitzer Prizes. Frankly, at least when it comes to the cinema/television arts, if I were a student I'd pass on a full scholarship at Harvard and beg my parents to mortgage the house for a degree from Tisch.

A guy who obviously did not have to mortgage the house to put two students through Tisch was one of this year's gala honorees. As the father of Tisch graduates Bryce and Paige Howard, child actor icon and American film director Ron Howard, was celebrated along with producer Brian Grazer, actress Marcia Gay Harden, arts philanthropist Diana King and HBO president Shelia Nevins. Harden, a 1988 graduate of the Tisch School has won both a Tony and an Academy Award for her work on stage and screen as alum.

Cornelia with her husband legendary producer Martin Bregman.

During the cocktail reception I caught up with Ron Howard after he exited the red carpet walk and asked him about his daughters' education at Tisch, "As you know, two of my daughters went through the Tisch arts program and Brian's [Glazer] daughter Sage is here now, it has meant the world to them. Not only what they have learned here, but the associations, the friendships and the collaborations that began here that has helped them along in their adult lives, both personally and professionally. Brian and I are getting an award that is about collaboration and that is one of the things I want to celebrate here tonight."

A graduate of the University of Southern California Film School and a life-long West Coast resident, Howard commented on his daughters' insistence on study in Manhattan at Tisch, "With my girls I couldn't even get them to look at other schools; it was very frightening as a father. They were so determined that this was the place and they got the grades and did well on their auditions."

Samuel L. Jackson was in attendance in support of Tisch and Denzel Washington's daughter Olivia.

Commending on the need for support of private arts institutions like Tisch Howard noted, "They need this kind of support. It is really crucial because the arts are invigorated and often led by people coming from corners of the country or the globe who don't necessarily have the resources to afford a place like this. So you want those people of great creative catalysis to have access to a school like Tisch."

Among the many luminary supporters of Tisch in attendance at the gala were award presenters 1982 Tisch graduate Spike Lee, HBO co-president Richard Plepler, SONY CEO and President Sir Howard Stringer and Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Tony Kushner. The evening's ceremony was hosted by 1989 graduate actress Kristen Johnston and attendees included actress Glenn Close, producer George Lucas and Hamptons resident and actor Alec Baldwin who gave the following event coif commentary regarding his, Grazer's and Howard's hair, ""All three of us represent three different extremes of hair, mine is perfect, Brian, yours is science fiction and Ron, yours is non-existent."

Honoree and Tisch students parent director Ron Howard.

Also among the many other notables in attendance was actor Samuel L. Jackson who in his comments to me regarding his support of the event and his friend Denzel Washington's daughter said, "I am here to support the school, as Olivia Washington, Denzel's daughter, is now in the school and she is very near and dear to us. I am happy that she is extending the legacy of what he does and what we all do. I am glad that she had the good sense to come to a school like this to get the rights and wrongs of what we learned to do in the theatre craft."

As the attendees were ushered from the cocktail reception to the awards ceremony I ran into long-time Southampton resident and acquaintance, the legendary producer Martin Bregman and his beautiful wife Cornelia. Bregman is on the Advisory Board of Tisch and spoke of his passion for the school and its reputation, "I have been involved with this school for a long, long time. It is very difficult to get into a good film school, very difficult! There is an overabundance of applicants. I think the Tisch School is probably the best in the country. It wasn't always that way, but it is now. A lot of my associates in Los Angles are sending their kids here."

Alumni and supporters packed the Fredrick P. Rose Hall during the the Tisch gala cocktail reception.

As we revel in the success of this year's Tisch Gala, it is more than obvious that there are many more to come for this seminal school of the arts. With each gala will undoubtedly come many more Oscars, Tony Awards and Emmys. It has been and will hopefully remain one of the country's greatest institutions for the nurturing of the future creators of American art and culture.