Hollywood Icon to Discuss Celebrity Life at the ROM on October 7, 2009
The Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) will bask in the glamour of Hollywood on Wednesday, October 7, in an evening with two-time Academy Award® winning actress Meryl Streep. During this special event, titled An Evening with Meryl Streep, sponsored by Infiniti, Ms. Streep will engage in an onstage conversation with Globe and Mail journalist Johanna Schneller. Drawing on her own experiences as a celebrated actress, Ms. Streep will discuss aspects of her working life. The evening forms part of The Question of Celebrity, programming surrounding the upcoming exhibition Vanity Fair Portraits: Photographs 1913-2008, presented by the Bay, opening at the ROM on Saturday, September 26.
"We are thrilled to welcome Ms. Streep to the ROM. She is a greatly respected artist and a true cultural icon. To hear her insight into the world of acting and to gain an understanding of what it is like to inhabit her sphere will be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Museum visitors,” said William Thorsell, ROM Director and CEO.
Ms. Streep is the recipient of a record-breaking 15 Oscar nominations and has starred in highly acclaimed films such as Kramer vs. Kramer, for which she won her first Academy Award®, The Deer Hunter, Out of Africa, A Cry in the Dark, The Bridges of Madison County, The Devil Wears Prada, Mamma Mia, Doubt and the recently released Julie & Julia. The proceeds from An Evening with Meryl Streep will benefit the ICC, and the charities Kageno and SafeHands for Mothers.
Johanna Schneller is a freelance journalist specializing in entertainment features and writes the weekly Fame Game column in The Globe and Mail newspaper. She has also hosted TVO’s Saturday Night at the Movies for the past two seasons.
Tickets to An Evening with Meryl Streep will be available for purchase online at www.rom.on.ca/streep from Saturday, September 12. General admission tickets cost $50.00, or $45.00 for ROM Members, and are expected to sell out quickly.
About Vanity Fair Portraits: Photographs 1913-2008:
September 26 marks the opening of the ROM’s Vanity Fair Portraits exhibition, featuring classic images from the magazine’s early years and contemporary images after its 1983 re-launch. The ICC at the ROM will be the only Canadian venue to display Vanity Fair Portraits, and this will be its first showing in eastern North America.
The exhibition, which garnered record-breaking attendance in its recent European and Australian engagements, showcases 146 portraits, and is the first major exhibition to bring together the magazine’s historic archive of rare vintage prints with its contemporary photographs. A collaboration between Vanity Fair and the National Portrait Gallery, London, the exhibition is curated by Terence Pepper, Curator of Photographs at the National Portrait Gallery, and David Friend, Vanity Fair’s Editor of Creative Development.
The exhibition was mounted to coincide with the 25th anniversary of the modern-era magazine and the 95th anniversary in 2008 of the original magazine’s founding and brings together a collection of captivating images of cultural icons from Louis Armstrong, Albert Einstein, Jean Harlow and Katharine Hepburn to Madonna, Matt Damon, President and Mrs. Reagan and Demi Moore, as captured by the greatest photographers of the age, including Edward Steichen and Annie Leibovitz.