Hasty Pudding Selects Barrymore, Hopkins

The Hasty Pudding Theatricals has selected Charlie's Angel's star Drew Barrymore and Hannibal's Anthony Hopkins as its man and woman of the year, the group announced earlier this week.

The actors will travel to Cambridge in February to receive the traditional "pudding pot" given to award recipients.

The Pudding honors two performers a year for their "lasting and impressive contribution to the world of entertainment" with a good-natured "roast," the pudding pot, and a special performance of the Hasty Pudding Theatricals' show.

Barrymore is the 50th recipient of the Woman of the Year award, first given to Gertrude Lawrence in 1951.

Barrymore will lead a parade through the Square on Feb. 8, escorted by a dozen Pudding men in drag.

The 40-minute procession ends at the Hasty Pudding Theatre, where the cast will preview three numbers from its 153rd production, Fangs for the Memories.

Barrymore will also lead a seminar for the Pudding's cast and staff.

"This will give everyone a great opportunity to talk to her and ask questions," said Pudding Press Manager Joanna S.B. O'Leary '03.

Hopkins will arrive in the Square

on Feb. 15 for the opening night

of the vampire-themed production Fangs

for the Memories.

Hopkins began his career as a theatre actor in his native Wales, becoming an understudy to Sir Laurence Olivier in 1965.

He made his film debut as Richard the Lionhearted in The Lion in the Winter, a role that garnered him an award nomination from the British Academy.

Hopkins received an Academy Award for his 1991 performance in The Silence of the Lambs as the cannibalistic psychiatrist Dr. Hannibel Lecter. He currently stars in Hannibal, the much-anticipated sequel.

Barrymore came into the public eye in 1982 with her role in Steven Spielberg's wildly successful E.T. The Extraterrestrial. She received a Youth in Film Award and a British Academy of Film and Television Artists Award nomination for Most Outstanding Newcomer for her performance.

Barrymore also earned critical acclaim for her roles in Gun Crazy and Irreconcilable Differences. She founded her own production company--Flower Films--which has produced many notable films including the box office smash Never Been Kissed. Most recently, she tried her hand as a producer in the box-office hit Charlie's Angels.

Set in the 1950's, the Transylvanian spoof Fangs is an original production with a script and score written by undergraduates. In keeping with tradition, the show's all-male cast will perform in drag.

The Pudding selects professionals to do the costumes and technical work for the play, which is usually performed 40 times in Cambridge before going on spring tour.

--Staff writer Daniela J. Lamas can be reached at lamas@fas.harvard.edu.