The Costume Designers Guild announced today that legendary Costume Designer Jeffrey Kurland will be honored with the Career Achievement Award and that three-time Academy Award® winning Actress Meryl Streep will receive the Distinguished Collaborator Award at the 19th CDGA (Costume Designers Guild Awards) presented by LACOSTE on Tuesday, February 21, 2017 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.
Salvador Perez, President of the Costume Designers Guild, stated, “Jeffrey Kurland and Meryl Streep’s contributions to our industry are immense. As leaders of their respective crafts, their work has influenced and entertained us for decades and continues to do so. We are thrilled to be honoring them both this year.”
The Career Achievement Award recognizes leaders who have made a lasting impact on Costume Design. Past recipients include Ellen Mirojnick, Julie Weiss, April Ferry, Eduardo Castro, Judianna Makovsky, Colleen Atwood, Sandy Powell, Ann Roth, and more.
The Distinguished Collaborator Award honors individuals who demonstrate unwavering support of Costume Design and creative partnerships with Costume Designers. Past recipients include Quentin Tarantino, Richard Linklater, Helen Mirren, Judd Apatow, Clint Eastwood, Rob Marshall, Jim Burrows, and Lorne Michaels, among others.
Produced by JumpLine, the annual CDGA gala celebrates excellence in film, television, and short-form Costume Design as voted on by the Guild’s membership, which includes more than 900 Costume Designers and Illustrators working in motion pictures, television, commercials, music videos, and new media programs throughout the world.
Jeffrey Kurland, 2017 Career Achievement Award Recipient
Jeffrey Kurland began his career in Costume Design in New York City. After graduating from Northwestern University with a B.A. in design, he moved to the East Coast to design for the theater, which soon segued into designing costumes for film when he began working with director Woody Allen. Jeffrey has the unique distinction of being the Costume Designer on 15 of Woody’s films. Beyond Mr. Allen’s films, he has since realized the visual story in film for more than 40 productions, collaborating with many renowned directors, including Milos Forman, Neil Jordan, Steven Soderbergh, Michael Mann, Nora Ephron, Brad Bird, Paul Feig, and Christopher Nolan to name but a few. He has created designs for leading ladies Julia Roberts, Marion Cotillard, Cameron Diaz, Annette Bening, Diane Keaton, Gena Rowlands, Emma Thompson, and Ellen Page. The list of leading men that he has sartorially represented includes George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Jamie Foxx, Tom Cruise, Robert Downey Jr. Michael Caine, Viggo Mortensen, Jeremy Irons, and Leonardo DiCaprio. He received a BAFTA Award, Britain’s highest film honor, for his designs for Radio Days and an Academy Award nomination for his work on Bullets Over Broadway. Jeffrey was awarded the Costume Designers Guild Award for his designs for the film Erin Brockovich and CDGA nominations for his work on Ocean’s 11 and Inception. Jeffrey sits on the board of Governors at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and is currently the first Vice President of AMPAS. For the past eight years he has created and produced the Governors Ball for the Oscar ceremony. In 2013, after many years of negotiation, he succeeded in creating a distinct Costume Design Branch in The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. He has spoken on the art of Costume Design in numerous symposiums at the Directors Guild of America, AFI, The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and UCLA. His design work has been featured in several exhibits around the world. He curated the exhibit 50 Designers/50 Costumes: Concept to Character for the Academy and was represented in the exhibition, Hollywood Costume, which began at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, and subsequently travelled to the United States and around the globe.
Meryl Streep, 2017 Distinguished Collaborator Award Recipient
For almost 40 years, Meryl Streep has portrayed an astonishing array of characters in a career that has cut its own unique path from the theater through film and television. Ms. Streep was educated in the New Jersey public school system through high school, graduated cum laude from Vassar College, and received her M.F.A with honors from Yale University in 1975. She began her professional life on the New York stage, where she quickly established her signature versatility and verve as an actor. Within three years of graduation, she made her Broadway debut, won an Emmy (for Holocaust), and received her first Oscar nomination (for The Deer Hunter). She has won three Academy Awards and in 2015, in a record that is unsurpassed, she earned a 19th Academy Award nomination for her role as The Witch in Into the Woods. Her performance also earned her Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Award nominations. Ms. Streep was most recently seen in Stephen Frears’ Florence Foster Jenkins. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and has been accorded a Commandeur de L'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Government and an honorary César. She received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Film Institute, a 2008 honor from the Film Society of Lincoln Center, and the 2010 National Medal of Arts from President Obama. In 2011, Ms. Streep received a Kennedy Center Honor, and in 2014 the Presidential Medal of Freedom. She holds honorary doctorates from Yale, Princeton, Harvard, Dartmouth, and Indiana Universities, the University Of New Hampshire, Lafayette, Middlebury, and Barnard Colleges.
About THE COSTUME DESIGNERS GUILD
The Costume Designers Guild, IATSE local 892, is a proud member of the international alliance of theatrical stage employees. In addition to our union services, we promote the artistry, technical expertise, and creative vision of our members who design authentic fictional characters with accuracy and integrity. The Guild’s membership includes more than 900 Costume Designers and Illustrators working in motion pictures, television, commercials, music videos, and new media programs throughout the world. Find the CDGA on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram and use #CDGA19. For updates and live tweeting during the show @CostumeAwards.
