The Walt Disney Company will be inducting 14 new Disney Legends to their awards program, according to The Walt Disney Company.
The 37th Disney Legends Awards honors artists and visionaries that have been part of the company's history and have “pushed the envelope of creativity, challenged conventional wisdom, and broken the restraints of the status quo in search of new possibilities and excellence.”
The presentation will be held at the company's D23: The Ultimate Disney Fan Event in Anaheim, California, on Aug. 11, 2023.
The 14 honorees include Steve Ditko, Harrison Ford, James Cameron, Jamie Lee Curtis, Angela Bassett and Miley Cyrus.
Disney CEO Bob Iger said, “To be named a Disney Legend is the highest honor our company can bestow on anyone, reserved for those whose talent and achievement have earned them an enduring place in our history.”
“The 14 individuals to be honored as Disney Legends this year have each made extraordinary creative contributions across the worlds of Disney and we look forward to celebrating them at D23: The Ultimate Disney Fan Event,” he continued.
Let's get to know this year's Disney Legends:
Colleen Atwood
The four-time Academy Award winner designed the costumes for Tim Burton's 2010 Alice in Wonderland as well as the the 2019 live-action re-imagination Dumbo. Her other credits include 2014's Into the Woods, 2016's Alice Through the Looking Glass, 2019's Lady and the Tramp and 2023's The Little Mermaid. She won her Oscars for best costume design for Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them in 2017, Alice in Wonderland in 2011, Memoirs of a Geisha in 2006 and Chicago in 2003.
Angela Bassett
The two-time Academy Award nominee and Honorary Academy Award recipient played Queen Ramonda in Marvel's 2018 and 2022 Black Panther films. The actress also received Emmy nominations for narrating National Geographic's 2018 documentary The Flood as well as the Disney+ docuseries The Imagineering Story in 2019. She also lent her voice to the Disney and Pixar's Oscar-nominated 2020 animated film Soul, as Dorothea Williams.
Martha Blanding
Blanding is the first permanent full-time Black tour guide at the Happiest Place on Earth. She is also the first black cast member to celebrate 50 years at the Disneyland Resort. Before she retired in 2022, she was a tour guide, VIP hostess and senior manager of Disneyland Resort Merchandist Special Events. Blanding is also one of the pioneering producers of the precursor to D23, the Official Disneyana Convention.
James L. Brooks
The three-time Academy Award winner is known for writing 1987's Broadcast News and 1983's Terms of Endearment, for which he won the three Oscar statuettes for best picture, director and writer. However, Brooks is best known as the co-creator, writer and producer of the longest-running primetime scripted series in TV history: The Simpsons.
James Cameron
Another three-time Academy Award winner, Cameron is best known for 1986's Aliens, 1989's The Abyss, 1997's Titanic and most recently the billion-dollar grossing franchise Avatar. The filmmaker also contributed to the creation of Disney's Animal Kingdom Theme Park at Florida's Walt Disney World Resort called Pandora — The World of Avatar. His Earthship Productions also partnered with National Geographic and Cameron also executive produces the Secrets Of… series.
Jamie Lee Curtis
The Academy Award-winning actress played both mom and daughter in the body-swap comedy in 2003's Freaky Friday with Lindsay Lohan. Lohan has confirmed that there's going to be an upcoming sequel. Curtis, also known as the Halloween Scream Queen, returned to Disney and the horror genre in 2023 when she played Madame Leota in Haunted Mansion.
Miley Cyrus
The recent two-time Grammy winning singer got her start as the Disney Channel's Hannah Montana. She played the double-life living superstar from 2006 to 2011. It premiered in March 2006 to the largest Disney Channel Original series audience. The show had 4.4 million average viewers per episode. Its 2007 episode is still the highest-rated basic cable telecast ever, earning 10.7 million viewers.
The actress/singer also lent her voice as Penny in the 2008 animated film Bolt as well as Mainframe in Marvel Studios' 2017 Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
Steve Ditko
The Atlas Comics (now Marvel Comics) writer-artist rechristened Amazing Adventures as Amazing Adult Fantasy with the late Disney legend Stan Lee. That comic book is where Spider-Man first appeared in 1962. Ditko also co-created Doctor Octopus, the Green Goblin and the Sinister Six. He also redesigned Iron Man's armor from gold in Tales of Suspense to the now iconic red and gold design.
Ditko and Lee also debuted Doctor Strange in Strange Tales. In the '90s, he co-create new Marvel characters such as Speedball and Squirrel Girl.
Harrison Ford
The legendary movie star occupies quite a special place in Disney for playing two of the most iconic characters in movie history: Han Solo in George Lucas' Star Wars and Indiana Jones in the Lucas and Steven Spielberg franchise. He recently reprised both characters in the Star Wars sequel trilogy and presumably his last Indy movie, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. He will next be seen in Marvel's upcoming Captain America: Brave New World as Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross.
Mark Henn
Henn first worked for the company on the Walt Disney Animation Studios' 1981 feature The Fox and the Hound. His first major animator role was for 1983's Mickey's Christmas Carol, as the titular mouse's animator. He then went on to animate Simba in 1994's The Lion King, Ariel in 1989's The Little Mermaid, Belle in 1991's Beauty and the Beast, Jasmine in 1992's Aladdin, Pocahontas in 1995, Mulan in 1998, Giselle from 2007's Enchanted and Tiana in 2009's The Princess and the Frog.
Frank Oz
The Primetime Emmy winner is a prolific puppeteer best known for co-directing 1982's The Dark Crystal with the late Disney Legend Jim Henson. Oz also directed and voiced a few characters in 1984's The Muppets Take Manhattan. However, he's most famous for originating and performing the Muppets' Miss Piggy, Fozzie, Sam Eagle and Animal. He was also the original voice of Yoda in Lucas' Star Wars movies. His first Yoda voice role was in 1980's The Empire Strikes Back and the last was in 2019's The Rise of Skywalker.
Kelly Ripa
Ripa has been with the Disney-owned network ABC for more than three decades. She currently co-hosts and executive produces Live with her husband Mark Consuelos. As an actress, she spent 10 years in All My Children from 1990 to 2010 as well as Hope & Faith in 2023. She has also hosted several Disney specials and was in Mickey's 90th Specatuclar.
Joe Rohde
Rohde spent four decades as a creative executive at Walt Disney Imageenering. He was the Animal Kingdom Theme Park's overall creative executive and supervising designer. He was also involved in Hawai'i's Aulani, A Disney Resort & Spa as well as Disney's California Adventure Park's Guardians of the Galaxy — Mission: BREAKOUT.
John Williams
The five-time Academy Award winner has composed the music for more than 100 movies. These include all of the Star Wars saga movies and all of the Indiana Jones films. His most recent nomination was for the 2023 Indiana Jones movie. He's the Academy's most-nominated living person, as well as the second-most-nominated person in Oscar history. The first is Walt Disney.
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