Jean Hersholt Award recipient Sherry Lansing, during the 79th Annual Academy Awards at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, CA, on Sunday, February 25, 2007.

Sherry Lansing, the former chairman of Paramount Pictures Motion Picture Group, has been voted the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award by the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. The award, an Oscar® statuette, will be presented to Lansing during the 79th Academy Awards presentation on February 25, 2007.

The Hersholt Award is given to an individual in the motion picture industry whose humanitarian efforts have brought credit to the industry.

“Sherry is being honored not only for her passionate work in support of fighting cancer,” said Ganis, “but because the Board recognized and remembered the long list of charitable organizations and causes she has served, and her long history in serving them. Sherry has earned enormous respect throughout the industry not only for her successful career as a producer and studio head, but because she has never failed to further devote her enormous energy to the needs of others.”

Lansing helped Dr. Armand Hammer form the nonprofit organization Stop Cancer and serves on its board. She is on the board of the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation, founded to honor excellence in basic and clinical science, and is a trustee of the American Association for Cancer Research. In addition, she serves on the Citizens’ Oversight Committee of the California Institute for Stem Cell Research and on the American Red Cross Board of Governors Advisory Committee and is a trustee of the Carter Center, the human rights organization formed by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter and his wife Rosalynn. She also serves as a regent of the University of California.

A graduate of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, Lansing got her feet wet in Hollywood as an actress, a career she quickly abandoned for production. She joined Talent Associates as an executive in charge of development in 1974, moving to MGM in 1975. She joined Columbia Pictures two years later as vice president in charge of production. She was named president of 20th Century-Fox Productions in 1980, and in 1983 formed Jaffe-Lansing Productions with Stanley Jaffe. After Jaffe was appointed president of Paramount Communications in 1990, Sherry became chairman of the Motion Picture Group in 1992.

Acceptance Speech

I am deeply honored and very grateful to receive this award, but I also must admit that it feels a little strange to be singled out. So many of you have causes that you are equally passionate about. That is really what is so wonderful about the movie industry—not only do we get to make films that matter, but we also work in a culture where we are encouraged to speak out. We may not always agree, but we do always care.

Through my work, I have met scientists who struggle every day to find cures for diseases. They do so quietly—without glamour or attention, but always with passion and conviction. I have met school teachers who are battling against insurmountable odds, and yet they never stop trying to reach our children. To me, they are the real heroes, and tonight I share this honor with all of them.

On a personal note, I want to thank my husband Billy and our two boys Cedric and Jack, whose unconditional love gives me the courage to fight every day for what I believe in. And a special thank you to the members of the Academy for this extraordinary honor. I promise to spend the rest of my life trying to live up to it.