Jane Pauley, Alex Gibney to Receive Lifetime Achievement Awards at News & Documentary Emmys

August 21, 2024 @ 9:00 AM

Jane Pauley and Alex Gibney will be honored with Lifetime Achievement awards at the 45th Annual News & Documentary Emmy Awards. The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) made the announcement on Wednesday.

Pauley, the Emmy-winning journalist, anchor and author who spent who first rose to national prominence as co-anchor of NBC’s “Today” in 1976, will receive her award at the News ceremony on Wednesday, September 25. Director and producer Gibney, who won the best documentary Oscar in 2008 for “Taxi to the Dark Side” and took home two Primetime Emmys in 2013 (for “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God”) and three in 2015 (for “Going Clear: Scientology & the Prison of Belief”), will be honored at the Documentary ceremony on Thursday, September 26. Both ceremonies will take place live at the Palladium Times Square in New York City and will stream live on watch.theemmys.tv.  

“We are honored to pay tribute to these two revered icons of our industry. Jane Pauley and Alex Gibney continue to reach viewers while at the same time opening doors for those coming behind them,” Adam Sharp, President and CEO of NATAS, said in a statement. “This honor is not only about impressive longevity in a competitive space, but also the broad and sweeping impact each has had on the business, their audiences, and the greater community. NATAS is proud to celebrate their enduring dedication to television excellence.” 

Throughout her more than five decades as a broadcast journalist, Pauley has won many awards — among them, four Daytime Emmys, five News & Documentary Emmys, a Sports Emmy, the Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in Journalism, the Edward R. Murrow Award for Outstanding Achievement and the Gracie Allen Award from the Foundation of American Women in Radio and Television. She is currently the anchor of “CBS News Sunday Morning.”

“I am so grateful for this recognition. It is the honor of a lifetime,” Pauley said in a statement. “My career has been a shared experience made possible by partnerships with the best in journalism and collaborations with its most inventive minds. Change and opportunity have been the constants. My career has not been a steady ascent but a winding path leading to my crowning achievement as host of ‘CBS News Sunday Morning.’”

In addition to his five Primetime Emmys, Gibney has won for News & Documentary Emmys, a Grammy, six Peabodys and six Writers Guild Awards. His latest project, the two-part HBO series “Wise Guys” about David Chase, will be available on HBO Max later this year. He is currently in production on “Musk,” a documentary “Musk” about Elon Musk, and the tentatively titled doc “Knife,” based on Salman Rushdie’s memoir “Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder.”

“I am grateful, humbled and deeply honored by this award,” Gibney said via statement. “While it has my name on it, it is also a powerful recognition of the work of my collaborators over the years, including my producers, cinematographers and, most especially, editors. It reminds me of that great two word poem, invented on the spot, at a speech at Harvard, by Muhammed Ali: ‘Me, We.’”