No awards season event has a higher ratio of notables to nobodies (amongst whom I count myself) than the annual AFI Awards luncheon, which also has an unbeatable ratio of winners to losers: indeed, every table in the ballroom of the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills —save for one for members of the press— is reserved for the principal personnel behind an American film or TV show that was chosen a month or so earlier, by a jury convened by the American Film Institute, as one of the previous year’s 10 best (plus, in some years, such as this one, a film or TV show that was tapped to receive a “special award”).
Attendees at this year’s luncheon included the crème de la crème of Hollywood’s A-list — among them One Battle After Another starLeonardo DiCaprio, Bugonia star/producer Emma Stone, Marty Supreme stars Timothée Chalamet and Gwyneth Paltrow, Avatar: Fire and Ash writer/director James Cameron, Wicked: For Good star Ariana Grande, Sinners writer/director Ryan Coogler and star Michael B. Jordan, Hamnet producer Steven Spielberg and writer/director Chloé Zhao, Jay Kelly stars George Clooney and Adam Sandler, Frankenstein writer/director Guillermo del Toro and star Jacob Elordi, Train Dreams star Joel Edgerton, Task star Mark Ruffalo, The Lowdown star Ethan Hawke, Severance stars Adam Scott and Britt Lower, Pluribus creator Vince Gilligan and star Rhea Seehorn and the list goes on — plus top execs at studios and networks (e.g. Netflix’s Ted Sarandos and Bela Bajaria, Warner Bros.’ Michael De Luca, FX’s John Landgraf, A24’s David Fenkel) and their parent companies (e.g. Apple’s Tim Cook).
It all made for a memorable, if somewhat crowded, cocktail hour. Cameron and DiCaprio, who collaborated on Titanic some 30 years ago, ran into each other and hugged. 2012 Sundance writers lab classmates-turned indie darlings-turned Marvel filmmakers-turned current Oscar contenders Coogler and Zhao caught up, as did Seehorn and Gilligan with the star of a prior Gilligan show, Breaking Bad’s Jesse Plemons, who was in the room as part of the Bugonia contingent. Zhao also posed with Grande and Hamnet star Jessie Buckley, and then with Spielberg and Cook. And Clooney and Sarandos chatted, before Clooney brought Sandler and their Jay Kelly costar Laura Dern over to say hello to the afternoon’s surprise guest, Carol Burnett.
The official festivities kicked off, as always, with a montage, beautifully assembled by AFI’s Chris Merrill, featuring great film and TV work from past years ending in the same number as the year of work being honored. This year’s reel, with “Smile” playing over it, evoked particular applause when clips appeared connected to people in the room — 1975’s Jaws, directed by Spielberg; 1995’s The Usual Suspects, featuring Benicio Del Toro (a star of One Battle After Another); 2015’s Creed, written/directed by Coogler and starring Jordan; The Revenant, starring DiCaprio; and Better Call Saul, starring Seehorn —and also when a clip played of Diane Keaton, who died in October, in 2005’s Something’s Gotta Give.
When the clip of Seehorn in Better Call Saul transitioned into a clip of her in Pluribus, it marked the start of a montage featuring each of the AFI Awards honorees for 2025, which prompted each table to erupt as their project came on the big screen.
Then, AFI president and CEO Bob Gazzale welcomed everyone; noted that “Smile” was written by Charlie Chaplin, whose granddaughter, actress Oona Chaplin, was in the room at the Avatar: Fire and Ash table; and said that the song had been chosen for the montage to acknowledge the challenges of 2025 that had impacted the Hollywood community —from the devastating wildfires of January through the tragic murders of Rob Reiner and Michelle Reiner in December —and the art that helped us to get through it: “We need your stories to help us make sense of emotions we cannot escape.”
Gazzale also acknowledged the heavy representation of AFI Conservatory alums amongst this year’s honorees, including Task creator Brad Ingelsby and Bugonia producer Ari Aster; and the presence in the room of two past recipients of the AFI Life Achievement Award, Clooney and Spielberg, as well as AFI’s founder George Stevens Jr., 93, who received a standing ovation.
Then came the reading, for the AFI Almanac, of the explanations for this year’s AFI Awards selections, delivered by the heads of the juries that selected them, and each followed by an extended clip of that project.
Rich Frank, who chaired a TV jury that considered 65 shows, noted that Disney+’s Andor “cuts deep”; Netflix’s Death by Lightning features a “brilliant cast”; Netflix’s The Diplomat boasts “an all-star ensemble”; FX’s The Lowdown features, via Hawke, “one of the year’s most magnetic performances”; HBO Max’s The Pitt “pulses with empathy” and is “taut and timely”; Apple TV+’s Pluribus is a “high concept slow burn” in which “Rhea Seehorn stands alone”; Apple TV+’s Severance succeeds on the back of a “stellar ensemble”; Apple TV+’s The Studio “cuts Hollywood bullshit to the bone”; and Task was “beautifully realized.”
Ava DuVernay spoke on behalf of the film jury, presenting a special award to Neon’s Iranian film It Was Just an Accident. She then called 20th Century’s Avatar: Fire and Ash “an appeal to the heart that beats within and connects all living things”; Focus’ Bugonia “a cinematic experience unlike any other” that features, courtesy of Stone and Plemons, “a master class in the art of acting”; Netflix’s Frankenstein “a monument to the art of cinema”; Focus’ Hamnet a film in which “Jessie Buckley gives the performance of a lifetime”; Netflix’s Jay Kelly “hilarious and heartbreaking” and “tailor-made for America’s leading man,” Clooney; A24’s Marty Supreme “set in the past but utterly of the moment,” with a performance by Chalamet that makes him “the undeniable leading man of a new generation”; Warners’ One Battle After Another “a rallying cry for fearless originality in American film” and a showcase for “cinema’s supernova, Leonardo DiCaprio”; Sinners “a wholly original vision” and “modern masterpiece” centered on “one of today’s brightest stars,” Jordan; Netflix’s Train Dreams “an art piece worthy of the highest poetry”; and Universal’s Wicked: For Good a musical built on “spellbinding performances” by Cynthia Erivo and Grande.
No project received louder applause, following the playing of its clip, than Sinners. Is that a reflection of people’s feelings about the film overall, or just the chosen scene (an absolute gem)? And regardless, does this indicate anything other than the opinions of the people in this particular room, or the industry overall? Time will tell.
The ceremony closed with remarks from Burnett, who was introduced to a standing ovation and declared: “What a lunch! The world is a better place for having heard your voices. Congratulations, and thank you so much.”