2021
Kathie Lee Gifford is an Emmy award-winning entertainer, author, and philanthropist. Gifford is best known as co-host of Live! With Regis and Kathie Lee and on the fourth hour of TODAY, alongside Hoda Kotb. The Gifford-Kotb hour had been hailed as “appointment television” by Entertainment Weekly, and “TODAY’s happy hour” by USA Today. These two talk show runs culminated in four Emmys and 11 Emmy nominations during more than 25 years in broadcasting.
In 2015, Gifford was inducted into the Broadcasting & Cable Hall of Fame, and earlier this year, received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. After 11 years as a face of TODAY, Gifford stepped down from that role to pursue other creative endeavors.
A playwright, producer, singer, songwriter, and actress, Gifford has starred in numerous television programs and movies in her 45-year career. She has written musicals including Broadway’s Scandalous, which received a Tony nomination for Best Actress in 2012. Gifford also starred on Broadway in Putting it Together and Annie. In the fall of 2020, she released Then Came You, a film she wrote, produced, and starred in alongside Craig Ferguson. Gifford also co-wrote the score for the film with Brett James. In April of 2019, she made her directorial debut with The God Who Sees oratorio, shot in Israel and based on a song she co-wrote with Grammy-nominated artist Nicole C. Mullen.
Gifford authored five New York Times bestselling books, including: It’s Never Too Late…Make the Next Act of Your Life the Best Act of Your Life; The Rock, The Road and the Rabbi; Just When I Thought I’d Dropped My Last Egg; I Can’t Believe I Said That; and the children’s book Party Animals.
Gifford’s philanthropic endeavors focus on improving quality of life for children and families. Through her partnership with the Association to Benefit Children, which provides family-based programming to support healthy childhood development, Gifford and her late husband, Frank, helped establish Cassidy’s Place and Cody House, named after their children, to provide respite care, education, and shelter for children in need. For more than two decades, Gifford has served as an ambassador for Childhelp, which prevents and treats child abuse, and as the spokesperson for Childhelp’s “Speak Up Be Safe” abuse prevention education curriculum.
Gifford also supports the New York City Rescue Mission, which provides assistance to New York City’s homeless population; the International Justice Mission, which works to end trafficking and slavery and ensure justice for victims is delivered in courts around the world; the Salvation Army, which spreads the gospel and charity of Christianity; and the Dream Center, which provides services from hunger relief to workforce training for families.
For her humanitarian work in labor relations, Gifford holds an honorary degree from Marymount University.
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