The only televised awards ceremony to exclusively honor actors, the SAG Awards® presents 13 awards in TV and film. Voted on by SAG-AFTRA’s robust and diverse membership of 130,000+ performers – the SAG Awards has the largest voting body on the awards circuit. Beloved for its style, simplicity, and genuine warmth, the show has become an industry favorite and one of awards season’s most prized honors since its debut in 1995.
The 29th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards®, presented by SAG-AFTRA with Screen Actors Guild Awards, LLC will take place on...
SAG-AFTRA represents more than 160,000 actors, announcers, broadcaster journalists, dancers, DJs, news writers, news editors, program hosts, puppeteers, recording artists, singers, stunt performers, voiceover artists and other professionals. SAG-AFTRA members are the faces and voices that entertain and inform America and the world. SAG-AFTRA members work together to secure the strongest protections for media artists into the 21st century and beyond.
When the first Screen Actors Guild Awards® were presented on March 8, 1995, the ceremony opened with a speech by Angela Lansbury introducing the concept behind the SAG Awards® and the Actor® statuette, along with giving a little of her own history as a performer. She ended by telling the assembled audience of SAG Awards® nominees and presenters, "Tonight is dedicated to the art and craft of acting by the people who should know about it: actors. And remember, you're one too!"
Thus began a tradition of the Screen Actors Guild Awards® opening with a distinguished actor telling the audience a bit about his/her perceptions of their craft or some brief biographical anecdote. For the SAG Awards®, the first eight years of that tradition was carried on by a single actor each year, with Michael Keaton, Dennis Hopper, John Lithgow, Kathy Bates, Whoopi Goldberg, James Woods and Sir Ian McKellen following chronologically in Lansbury's footsteps.
The concept was so well received that for the 9th Annual SAG Awards®, supervising producer Gloria Fujita O'Brien suggested a new twist on the tradition. By having actors tell shorter stories, it would allow room for actors of all ages and backgrounds to tell tales with many different emotional tones. To make it even more fun for the audience, the producers decided to keep the identities of those storytellers secret until they popped up on camera.
Since the Inaugural Screen Actors Guild Awards, 107 actors have told their stories, typically closing with their name and the signature line, "I am an actor."
When the first Screen Actors Guild Awards® were presented on March 8, 1995, the ceremony opened with a speech by Angela Lansbury introducing the concept behind the SAG Awards® and the Actor® statuette, along with giving a little of her own history as a performer. She ended by telling the assembled audience of SAG Awards® nominees and presenters, "Tonight is dedicated to the art and craft of acting by the people who should know about it: actors. And remember, you're one too!"
Thus began a tradition of the Screen Actors Guild Awards® opening with a distinguished actor telling the audience a bit about his/her perceptions of their craft or some brief biographical anecdote. For the SAG Awards®, the first eight years of that tradition was carried on by a single actor each year, with Michael Keaton, Dennis Hopper, John Lithgow, Kathy Bates, Whoopi Goldberg, James Woods and Sir Ian McKellen following chronologically in Lansbury's footsteps.
The concept was so well received that for the 9th Annual SAG Awards®, supervising producer Gloria Fujita O'Brien suggested a new twist on the tradition. By having actors tell shorter stories, it would allow room for actors of all ages and backgrounds to tell tales with many different emotional tones. To make it even more fun for the audience, the producers decided to keep the identities of those storytellers secret until they popped up on camera.
Since the Inaugural Screen Actors Guild Awards, 107 actors have told their stories, typically closing with their name and the signature line, "I am an actor."
