The decision by the New York Film Critics’ Circle to announce their year end honorees at the end of November has left a bad taste in the mouths of many in the industry, but their early move didn’t have any repercussions with their West Coast brethren. The Los Angeles Film Critics Association met today and, as expected, decided to keep their own year end awards announcement on the second weekend of December. That means LAFCA will chime in on awards season on Sunday, Dec. 11. Currently, the awards dinner is set for Sat. January 14, 2012 at a location to be determined.
Most importantly, LAFCA also announced that this year’s lifetime achievement award will go to iconic screen legend Doris Day.
The 87-year-old icon was a box office star of the ’50s and ’60s appearing in such films as “Pillow Talk,” “Calamity Jane,” “The Pajama Game” and Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Man Who Knew Too Much.” She received an Academy Award nomination for best actress for “Pillow Talk” in 1960 and was nominated for 11 Golden Globes, winning three as well as the Cecil B. DeMille Award in 1989. Day ended her film career in 1968 with “With Six You Get Eggroll” and transitioned to television where she starred in “The Doris Day Show” on CBS from 1968 to 1973. Day also has a very successful singing career and is most famous for “Whatever Will Be, Will Be (Que Sera, Sera)” which was first introduced in “The Man Who Knew Too Much” and also became the theme for her TV show. More recently, Day became a champion for animal rights causes and those charitable efforts was a key reason she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2004.
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