Humanitas Prize
Humanitas Prize | |
---|---|
Awarded for | United States of America |
First awarded | 1975 |
Website | www |
The Humanitas Prize is an award for film and television writing, and is given to writers whose work explores the human condition in a nuanced and meaningful way.[1] It began in 1974 with Father Ellwood "Bud" Kieser—also the founder of Paulist Productions—but is generally not seen as specifically directed toward religious cinema or TV. The prize is distinguished from similar honors for screenwriters in that a large cash award, between $10,000, accompanies each prize. Journalist Barbara Walters once said, "What the Nobel Prize is to literature and the Pulitzer Prize is to journalism, the Humanitas Prize has become for American television."[2]
The Humanitas Prizes are annually presented by the nonprofit organization Humanitas, which also operates a host of other programs, including the New Voices Fellowship, the Humanitas College Screenwriting Awards, and other public event programming.[3]
History
Kieser founded the Human Family Educational and Cultural Institute (dba Humanitas) in 1974 to present the award. Beginning as primarily a television award, the first Humanitas Prize winners were announced on the
When establishing the Humanitas Prize, Kieser determined that the writer was the source of the most humanizing values in any program and should therefore be the focus of the awards. Although lists of Humanitas Prize winners for television categories often tell only the name of the program, the award is made to the writers of specific episodes, and more than one episode of a given show may be among the finalists in any given year; similarly, reports on the film categories often give more prominence to the film's title, but the award goes to the writing staff. In 2005 Humanitas winners included
In 2006, the documentary film
The most wins—four—by any single program was for writers of the TV series
Writers who have won three times include Aaron Sorkin (for The West Wing and Sports Night), David E. Kelley (Picket Fences, The Practice), David Milch (Hill Street Blues, NYPD Blue) and Marshall Herskovitz (thirtysomething, Once and Again, and the telefilm Special Bulletin). While at least four writers have had back-to-back wins, it is not unusual for several years to pass between one writer's winning the prize again. To date the longest gap was the case of China Beach writer-producer John Sacret Young, who won in 1978 for the telefilm Special Olympics, then won his second Humanitas Prize 21 years later for the TV movie Thanks of a Grateful Nation. (Young eventually went on to become a member of the Humanitas Board of Directors, where he served with at least four other repeat prizewinners.[6])
While the Humanitas Prize is awarded to the writers of produced work only, Humanitas also supports un-produced screenwriters. Humanitas annually awards two college students with the Carol Mendelsohn College Drama Award and the David and Lynn Angell College Comedy Award. The Angell College Comedy Award was founded after
Media references
This article needs additional citations for verification. (August 2022) |
In season 4, episode 19 of Boston Legal, Carl Sack, played by John Larroquette, stated, "Well, there goes my Humanitas Award," after a long rant against organized religion. By itself, it was a meta-reference to both Larroquette's short-lived eponymous sitcom winning the award in 1995, along with Boston Legal creator David Kelley winning it in 1996 and 2003.
The short lived
In the 2007
Winners and nominees
See also
Notes
- ^ "Humanitas About Page".
- ^ John L. Allen, Jr., Three careers illustrate the fallacy of media-bashing[dead link], National Catholic Reporter, March 13, 1998
- ^ "Humanitas About Page".
- ^ "Humanitas Prize: 2006 Special Award" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2008-07-04.
- ^ Humanitas: Past Winners Archived April 6, 2010, at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "Humanitas Board Members". Archived from the original on 2010-07-04. Retrieved 2010-10-22.
- ^ Andreeva, Nellie (15 November 2010). "Humanitas, Major TV Networks & Studios To Develop Pilots By Emerging Writers". Deadline Hollywood.
- ^ "New Voices Fellowship". 22 November 2021.
External links
- The Humanitas Prize site
- The Humanitas Prize: Encouraging Hollywood's Best, profile by Jack Wintz for American Catholic