Renowned actress Meryl Streep, winner of the prestigious 2023 Princess of Asturias Award for the Arts, recently celebrated a week-long series of events in Asturias, Spain. The award recognized Streep’s significant contributions to the arts and her illustrious career in film.
A week-long celebration of the Princess of Asturias Awards
The highlight of the week-long celebrations was an open dialogue between Meryl Streep and fellow actor Antonio Banderas, offering a unique insight into her award-winning career. This public meeting, moderated by Sandra Rotondo, a member of the Jury for the Princess of Asturias Award for the Arts, also included a Q&A session, providing attendees with the opportunity to interact with the celebrated actress at the Exhibition and Conference Centre in Oviedo.
As part of the “Awards Week”, Meryl Streep also connected with the local community. She met with teachers and students from secondary, baccalaureate and vocational training schools who had participated in the “Meryl’s Choices” activity, part of the “Taking the Floor” cultural programmes. This meeting was held at La Vega Arms Factory in Oviedo.
In addition, Streep interacted with students from the School of Dramatic Arts of the Principality of Asturias (ESAD). In her honour, the students performed scenes from Spanish plays at the ESAD centre in Gijón.
The Foundation also organized a series of tributes to Meryl Streep across different locations in Asturias. These included a film cycle showcasing Streep’s iconic films and a live concert by Donna and the Dynamos, a tribute to Meryl Streep’s role in Mamma Mia!
The “Awards Week” cultural programme, designed by the Foundation, included participation from the Princess of Asturias Laureates in activities leading up to the Awards Ceremony at the Campoamor Theatre.
Meryl Streep’s Ongoing Achievements of a Lifetime
Born in Summit (USA) on 22 June 1949, Mary Louise Streep, known as Meryl Streep, began her artistic studies at the age of twelve with singing lessons and added acting classes in high school. A graduate of Vassar College (1971) and the Yale School of Drama (1975), Streep began her career in New York theatres and performed in several Broadway productions, including the 1977 revival of Anton Chekhov’s drama The Cherry Orchard.
With three Oscars, eight Golden Globes, two BAFTAs and three Emmys, Meryl Streep is considered one of the greatest contemporary actresses of our time. Best known for her film roles, she has stood out for her characteristic versatility, which critics say is based on her extraordinary ability to play a wide variety of characters and to reproduce different accents.
She holds the all-time record for Oscar nominations (21) and Golden Globe nominations (32) and is one of only two living actresses to have won the Academy Award three times. The first time she won Best Supporting Actress for Kramer vs Kramer (1979), which also won her a Golden Globe in the same category.
In the early 1980s she had her first leading roles, for which she was particularly well known: The French Lieutenant’s Woman (1981), for which she received a BAFTA and a Golden Globe, an award she repeated with Sophie’s Choice (1982), for which she also won her second Oscar. Films such as S. Pollack’s Out of Africa (1985), Ironweed (1987) and Evil Angels (1988), for which she received an award at Cannes, are some of her best performances of the decade.
Her filmography with some of her most iconic characters includes The Bridges of Madison County (1995), Marvin’s Room (1996), The Hours (2002), The Devil Wears Prada (2006), The Doubt (2008) (an American Screen Actors Guild award-winning performance), the musical Mamma mia! (2008) and The Iron Lady (2011), in the role of Margaret Thatcher, which won her a Golden Globe and a BAFTA, as well as her third Oscar. Florence Foster Jenkins (2016), The Post (2017), Little Women (2019), Let Them All Talk (2020) and Don’t Look Up (2021) are some of her latest works.
A philanthropist and committed to the defence of women’s rights and gender equality, she has been a member of the advisory board of the organisation Equality Now and in 2018 she participated in the documentary This Changes Everything, about gender discrimination in Hollywood.
A member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres de France, Streep has received numerous honorary awards including the César (France, 2003), the Donostia Award at the San Sebastian Film Festival (Spain, 2008), the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival (Germany, 2012), the Stanley Kubrick Britannia (UK, 2015) and the Cecil B. DeMille Award (USA, 2015). DeMille (USA, 2017), among others, and was awarded the 2010 National Medal of Arts and the 2014 Presidential Medal of Freedom.
