When Jeremy Irons took to the stage to accept his Lifetime Achievement award, he was greeted by a standing ovation, thunderous applause and cheering from the crowd at the Trustees Theater.
Irons, whose impressive career spans nearly 50 years, was at the Savannah Film Festival not only to receive the honorary award but also to teach the students a master class.
“When I’m not working, I don’t feel like an actor,” Irons explained. “I have a lot of other things I love doing. Some of which I’ve been talking about and will be talking about here.”
Students were delighted when the actor sat down after the screenings of “Trashed” and “Lolita” last Monday to answer questions about his involvement in the films.
The Lifetime Achievement award is just one of the many awards in Irons’ possessions. The actor has previously won an Oscar for “Reversal of Fortune” and a Tony for “The Real Thing.” To him, his latest award “makes me think, ‘Well I hope there’s a bit more to come!’” He told audiences with a laugh.
The actor then went on to thank the school for the award, praising them for mixing their students in the arts.
“I think that is wonderful because we’re trying to do the same thing, really,” Irons said. “We’re trying to communicate our passions. We’re trying to react to what we see around us and in a little way, we’re trying to make the place a bit better, a bit more interesting, a bit more colorful, a bit more unique… Slightly different because of our passing through it in whatever area we’re working, whether it be fabric design or preservation of buildings or what.”
Irons, who has done his own restoration to Kilcoe Castle in Ireland, also commended the school for also refurbishing old buildings in Lacoste and Hong Kong in order to be used by the students.
“To have a university with an international outlook and an international perspective where all the arts mingle together and play off each other is wonderful,” he said. “You send your students away so they can look back at where they come from and see it maybe with clearer eyes.”
He added that he admired the school not only prepares their students “for future work but starting them off with what could be their future contacts while they’re here doing projects that involve having industry coming here.”
As he closed his speech, Irons thanked the school once again for the honor.
“It’s a beacon, really, isn’t it?” Irons said of his award, causing the audience to laugh. “And when I look at it on my shelf when I turn it on- because I won’t turn it on much because I try to conserve energy- but when I turn it onto look at it, I will think of that beacon in Savannah and I hope that many of you who are passing through it, you will enter the world in whatever way you wish and whatever way you can, in a little way be also a beacon.”
