The Venice Film Festival will honor George Clooney with its 2026 Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement.
Clooney – who is one of only three people to have been nominated in six different Oscar categories throughout his career (best picture, director, lead actor, supporting actor, original screenplay and adapted screenplay) – will be celebrated on the Lido in his triple guise as actor, director and producer.
“A perfect combination of the star glamour of days gone by, remarkable professionalism, and modern sensitivity, the actor has crossed genres with rare versatility: war movies with ‘Three Kings’ and ‘Syriana’; thrillers with ‘Michael Clayton’; sophisticated comedies with ‘Ocean’s Eleven’ and ‘O Brother Where Art Thou?’; science fiction with ‘Gravity’ and ‘Solaris’ and and bittersweet comedies with ‘The Descendants,’ ‘Up In the Air,’ and ‘Jay Kelly,'” the Venice Biennale – which oversees the fest – said in a statement.
“In each one of these movies, he calibrated his register while remaining true to himself: ironic and melancholy, fascinating and reflective, brilliant and capable of unexpected depth,” it added.
“He did the same in the nine films he made when he decided to go behind the movie camera, all of which reveal a demanding and generous concept of cinema,” it continued, citing Clooney-directed films “Confessions of a Dangerous Mind,” “Good Night and Good Luck,” “The Ides of March,” and “Suburbicon” as “examples of films that are refined, ambitious, and outside the rules and conventions of Hollywood cinema,” it noted.
