The Screen Actors Guild will honor Alan Alda, the beloved, laugh-inducing Captain Hawkeye Pierce on CBS's long-running hit show, MASH, with its lifetime achievement award on Sunday, January 27.
To top it off, two-time SAG award winner Tom Hanks will present the special annual award to Alda, who turns 83 the next day, on January 28. Alda is a three-time SAG Awards nominee, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
"I'm so thrilled that Tom agreed to that," Alda told the Associated Press.
Even though he's played some evil characters on the big and small screen, Alda is synonymous with Hawkeye, the fun-loving, hard-working, caring MASH military doctor leading distracting shenanigans with co-conspirator Trapper John (Wayne Rogers), then B.J. Hunnicutt, played by Mike Farrell. The ultra-popular show ran from 1972 to 1983.
"It is an honor and privilege to announce that our SAG Life Achievement Award will be presented to the fabulous Alan Alda," SAG-AFTRA president Gabrielle Carteris said in a statement in October to The Hollywood Reporter.
"He is an artist whose body of work is a testament to the craft and the magic of our business," she added. "His ability to make us laugh, to think and to feel is extraordinary. From theater to television, movies, and new media, Alan's dedication and talent are exceeded only by his contributions to a just and caring society."
With the special honor, Alda firmly cements his legacy with the best of them. Previous SAG lifetime achievement award winners include Lily Tomlin, Carol Burnett, Debbie Reynolds, Dick Van Dyke, Mary Tyler Moore, Ernest Borgnine and Betty White.
Jam-packed with major talent, the 25th annual SAG awards tout Megan Mullally of Will & Grace and theater fame as host. The show starts at 8 p.m. on ET, but will broadcast simultaneously on TBS and TNT, as well.
Alda and Hanks worked together in Bridge of Spies, the 2015 Steven Spielberg thriller. Alda played Thomas Watters, a law firm partner to Hanks' lead turn as lawyer James Donovan, who defending KGB agent Rudolf Abel.
Alda plays Geppetto in Disney's live-action Pinocchio and the Mister Rogers biopic.
But it was Alda as Hawkeye that made his career. He played with a solid, tender, funny ensemble comprised of Loretta Swit, Jamie Farr, William Christopher, Harry Morgan, Gary Burghoff, David Ogden Stiers, Larry Linville, Kellye Nakahara, McLean Stevenson and of course, partners-in-crime Rogers, then Farrell.
MASH won a dizzying array of awards, including eight Golden Globes – five of which were Alda's alone, dozens of Primetime Emmy Awards and a slew of honors from Directors Guild of America, American Cinema Editors, ASCAP Film and Television Music Awards, Humanitas Prize, Online Film and Television Association, Peabody Awards, People's Choice Awards, Television Critics Association Awards, TV Land Awards, Writers Guild of America, Young Artist Awards.
Tom Hanks to present Golden Globe- and Emmy-winner Alan Alda with a lifetime achievement award at the upcoming Screen Actors Guild Award ceremony. "I'm so thrilled that Tom agreed to that," Alda told AP. https://t.co/qquoVTSHHd @jacarucci
— The Associated Press (@AP) January 8, 2019
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