Landau Honored:
SONY Photo Gallery
Longtime friend Mark Rydell presented the Christie Digital Lifetime Achievement Award to Martin Landau.
Landau Honored
With Lifetime
Achievement Award
Saying he is still as excited about reading a good script as ever, Martin Landau was honored by the 7th Annual Method Fest with a Christie Design Lifetime Achievement Award at the closing Awards Party in Calabasas.
Landau, who has graced the American film scene for almost five decades, won an Academy Award for his role in Ed Wood, and was nominated two other times. He joins Maximillian Schell, James Earl Jones, Rod Steiger, Peter Falk and Dennis Hopper on the Method Fest's top special awards list from festivals past.
A highly memorable film and television presence, Landau attended New York City's famed Actors' Studio, where James Dean was among his closest friends.
Of the 2,000 performers that auditioned for The Actors Studio in 1955, only two were accepted: Steve McQueen and Landau. Alfred Hitchcock had seen him on Broadway in "The Middle of the Night" and immediatley cast him in North by Northwest as James Mason's henchman who stalks Cary Grant.
Ron Gilbert with Martin Landau at Award Ceremony.
Landau continued to land major supporting roles in such movies as Cleopatra (1963). He found fame as a costar of TV's "Mission: Impossible" (1966-69) and "Space: 1999" (1975-77), both of which teamed him with at the time real-life spouse Barbara Bain. From the late 1970s through the mid 1980s Landau worked mainly as an acting teacher, until a juicy supporting role as Jeff Bridges' unlikely partner Abe Karatz in Tucker: The Man and His Dream (1988) earned him an Oscar nomination and renewed attention.
Woody Allen gave him a prime leading part as an amoral married man who has his mistress killed in Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989), which merited another Oscar nomination. Then Tim Burton thought of Landau for another perfect part: that of the aging Bela Lugosi in his offbeat biopic Ed Wood (1994). Landau's performance was nothing short of astonishing, and it finally earned him that Supporting Actor Oscar.
At the Method Fest, Landau starred in "The Aryan Couple," a movingly acted and beautifully produced World War II drama.
2005 Award Winners, Nominees Geraldine Page Award for Best Actress : Nominees John Garfield Award for Best Actor : Nominees Winner Breakout Acting Performance in a Feature Film Nominees Winner Best Feature Nominees Winner Best Director Nominees Winner Best Screenplay Nominees Winner Best Supporting Actor in a Feature Film Nominees Winner Best Supporting Actress in a Feature Film Nominees Winner The Crown Realty Award for Best Actress in a Short Film Winner Best Ensemble Cast: Nominees Winner Maverick Award for Quality In A Low-Budget Film : Nominees Winner Best Short Film Nominees Winner Best Actor in a Short Film: Nominees Winner Best Actress in a Short Film : Nominees Winner Best Student Short Nominees Winner Festival Director's Award for Excellence in Film Festival Director's Award for Excellence in Acting Festival Director's Award for Excellence in Short Filmmaking Audience Awards: Feature – Waterborne Special Mention Awards Fields of Mudan The Method Fest Film Festival Youth Outreach Program The Method Fest Film Festival Youth Outreach Program screened ten short films created by middle and high school students on April 7, 2005 at the Calabasas Library to a full house. The diverse program of short films was selected from entries submitted by students local to the Calabasas area as well as films from around the country. The youth screening and the awards were sponsored by Sony, Final Draft and Rhythm Films. The program included: "Summer Solstice" by Ken Roy, "By Sunrise" by Adam Lier, "Understanding" by Robby Smith, "Outside" by Evan Payne, "Two Blind Mice" by Stefani Feldman, "A Trip to the Barbershop" by Agoura High School Student, Ethan Kuperberg and Calabasas' own Viewpoint School's "Lockerspace" by Brian Tannenebaum, Gabriel Perez, Philip Guidon, Brent Davis, Bryan Gold, David Sheftell and Nathan DeRemer. Also screening will be "The Sphere", "Roses" and "Child Abuse," which were created by students at Los Angeles' Robert A. Millikan Middle School and Performing Arts Magnet. At the April 8th Method Fest Film Festival Awards Ceremony, the winners of the Youth Competition were announced. Geoffrey Pepos, Youth Outreach Coordinator for the Festival said at the awards ceremony, "I was more than pleased with the quantity and quality of films we received this year, especially given that it was our first year for a youth film/screenwriting competition. There is a lot of talent out there in our youth. These [youth] films rival many of the films submitted to the "regular" Method Fest. That's exciting." High School Division: Best Actor: Best Screenplay: Middle School Division: |
