As with many veterans of the Film Society of Lincoln Center, which is being renamed Film at Lincoln Center to mark its 50th Anniversary this week, longtime former executive director Joanne Koch has some stories to tell.
“We tried to get Katharine Hepburn at the Chaplin Gala, and she wrote me and said she’d rather go to the South Pole,” Koch laughs. “But when we honored George Cukor in 1978, she was very nervous, but she came — and the audience went crazy.”
So did the Lincoln Center board chairman George Weissman in 1989, but for another reason. “The New York Film Festival was showing ‘Roger and Me,’ which attacked General Motors, a substantial donor to Lincoln Center. I remember [George] saying, ‘Are you really going to show this film?’ I said yes, and we did.”
Longtime former program director and Nyff selection committee chairman Richard Peña has a slightly different memory of the screening.
“We tried to get Katharine Hepburn at the Chaplin Gala, and she wrote me and said she’d rather go to the South Pole,” Koch laughs. “But when we honored George Cukor in 1978, she was very nervous, but she came — and the audience went crazy.”
So did the Lincoln Center board chairman George Weissman in 1989, but for another reason. “The New York Film Festival was showing ‘Roger and Me,’ which attacked General Motors, a substantial donor to Lincoln Center. I remember [George] saying, ‘Are you really going to show this film?’ I said yes, and we did.”
Longtime former program director and Nyff selection committee chairman Richard Peña has a slightly different memory of the screening.
- 4/29/2019
- by Gregg Goldstein
- Variety Film + TV
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