Ang Lee will be honored by NYU Tisch School of the Arts at the 2020 Tisch Gala. © 2019 Paramount Pictures. Credit: Brian Bowen Smith
NYU Tisch School of the Arts today announced its 2020 gala, to be held on Monday, April 6, 2020, at the Ziegfield Ballroom in Manhattan. Notable alumnus and award-winning director and producer Ang Lee ’84 (MFA, Film) was also announced as one of the gala’s esteemed honorees.
The annual gala celebrates the incredible accomplishments of the iconic arts institution and showcases the depth and breadth of the school’s program offerings. All proceeds from the gala will go towards funds to support the critical needs of talented Tisch students.
“Ang Lee personifies what we teach to our students at NYU Tisch: if you have the courage to follow your vision, there’s a place in the world for your voice,” said Allyson Green, Dean, NYU Tisch School of the Arts. “We honor Ang this year because he has remained daring in the films he has made throughout his celebrated career. He has challenged social customs with The Wedding Banquet, crafted a classic period drama with Sense and Sensibility, helmed a martial arts epic with Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, shared the universal story of love in Brokeback Mountain, and willingly pioneered new technologies to make The Life of Pi and Gemini Man.”
Ang Lee was born in Pingtung County, Taiwan. The son of a high school principal with traditional ideas about education, Lee chose to study theater in America instead. He went on to earn an MFA in film production at NYU Tisch School of the Arts in 1984. In 1990, Lee made his first feature film, Pushing Hands, which garnered international praise and paved the way for a trajectory of future successes. Over the course of his career in filmmaking, Lee has been nominated for nine Academy Awards and eleven Golden Globe awards. He received Academy Awards in the categories of Best Director (Life of Pi and Brokeback Mountain) and Best Foreign Language Film (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon); Golden Globe Awards in the categories of Best Director (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Brokeback Mountain), Best Motion Picture – Drama (Sense and Sensibility and Brokeback Mountain) and Best Foreign Language Film (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon). Lee also won the Producers Guild of America Award for Brokeback Mountain, and the Directors Guild of America Award for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Brokeback Mountain. His films also include The Wedding Banquet (Golden Bear, Berlin Film Festival), Eat Drink Man Woman, The Ice Storm, Ride with the Devil, Hulk, Lust, Caution (Golden Lion), Taking Woodstock, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, and Gemini Man. He lives in New York with his wife.
Since its founding in 1965, the Tisch School of the Arts has established itself as one of the leading arts schools in the country. It draws on the vast artistic and cultural resources of New York City and New York University to create an extraordinary training ground for artists, scholars and innovators. Today, students learn their craft in a spirited, risk-taking environment that combines the professional training of a conservatory with the liberal arts education of a premier global university with campuses in New York, Abu Dhabi, Shanghai and 11 academic centers around the world.
Thousands of Tisch alumni have gone on to enjoy fulfilling careers in the arts, including renowned artists such as Pulitzer Prize winners Annie Baker (also a MacArthur Fellow), Tony Kushner, Doug Wright and Chang Lee; Academy Award winners Mahershala Ali, Kevin Willmott, Martin Scorsese, Oliver Stone, Spike Lee, Marcia Gay Harden, Mark Bridges and Keiko Ibi; Tony Award winners Ali Stroker, Nina Arianda, Beowulf Boritt, Steve Kazee, George C. Wolfe, Michael Mayer, Idina Menzel, Stephen Spinella, Frank Wood and Paul Tazewell; Emmy Award winners Alec Baldwin, Sterling K. Brown, Billy Crystal, Vince Gilligan, Donald Glover (also a Grammy Award winner as Childish Gambino), Camryn Manheim and Debra Messing; Golden Globe winners Rachel Brosnahan, Rachel Bloom and Gina Rodriguez; acclaimed filmmakers Amy Heckerling and Colin Trevorrow; Grammy Award winners Lady Gaga (also an Academy Award winner) and Amber Gray; Grammy Award nominees Maggie Rogers and Elle Varner; entrepreneur Dennis Crowley; MacArthur Fellowship recipients Kyle Abraham, Branden Jacobs-Jenkins (also a Pulitzer Prize finalist), Camille Utterback and Mimi Lien; visual artist Leo Villareal; actors Danai Gurira and Corey Stoll; and photographer Tyler Mitchell.
For media inquiries, contact Nico Ericksen-Deriso at The TASC Group at 212-337-8870 or nico@thetascgroup.com.