This announcement was originally made November 23, 2005

New York Women in Communications, Inc. (NYWICI) will honor Geena Davis among others for its 2006 Matrix Awards. The 2006 awards acknowledge outstanding women who have distinguished themselves in the communications fields of advertising, arts & entertainment, books, film, magazines, marketing, newspapers and radio. The ceremony, sponsored by the Oxygen Network, will be emceed by Ellen DeGeneres. The 2006 Matrix Awards event will take place at a luncheon in the Waldorf-Astoria on “Matrix” Monday, April 3, 2006.

Michele Hatty has a great cover story on Geena in the January 22 edition of USA WEEKEND. Photograph by Robert Sebree.

This article is great in that it cuts a little closer – it mentions how Geena met her husband, it explains her motto in life, it describes her relationship to her kids, and it even mentions a couple of new hobbies of hers: rowing (!) and sudoku. Monster sudoku, mind you! ;) Here it is in full:

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Unfortunately no award for Geena this weekend. However, a couple of pictures have found their way to the gallery!

The filmography section now has subpages presenting all TV-appearances Geena has done as an actress, both full series and some individual episodes she has guest-starred. I am grateful for any image material anyone can help out with for some of the subjects!

The Actor®, the Screen Actors Guild Awards® statuette for Outstanding Performance, will be presented on Sunday, January 29, 2006, from the Los Angeles Shrine Exposition Center and televised live nationally on TNT and TBS at 8 PM (ET/PT), 7 PM (Central), 6 PM (Mountain). We’re crossing our fingers for Geena, who is nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series. She up against Patricia Arquette (Medium), Mariska Hargitay (Law and Order: Special Victims Unit), Sandra Oh (Grey’s Anatomy), and Kyra Sedgwick (The Closer). Best of luck!

Not excactly the newest article around, I still wanted to post this, as it contains several of the quotations found scattered over the ‘net. By Pete McEntegart for Sports Illustrated Nov. 18, 2002

An accomplished archer (she has ranked as high as 13th in the U.S.) and a trustee for the Women’s Sports Foundation, the 46-year-old Academy Award winner had her first child, Alizeh, in April.

SI: What is your role with the Women’s Sports Foundation?

Geena Davis: I have a Web site [GeenaTakesAim.com] that parents and girls can use to learn about Title IX and take action if they find their school is not in compliance. Thirty years after Title IX passed, 80 percent of schools are not in compliance.

SI: Were you much of an athlete growing up Wareham, Mass.?

- I competed in the high jump in high school, but I wasn’t very good. My technique was to stand around looking intimidating because I was so tall.

SI: Would Thelma from Thelma and Louise have been a supporter of Title IX?

- For sure. You know, she might not have had to go on that rampage if she had played sports in school.

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Original story by Roger Catlin for Philadelphia Inquirer, Jan 27 2006.
Read a related story here.

Familiar portraits of presidents stare down from the paneled walls, but the tangle of klieg lights reveals this is not 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. but the latest Hollywood set to capture the White House in a popular drama. A key difference in the replicated Oval Office: a seven-foot desk long enough to accommodate the full length of Geena Davis, Golden Globe-winning star of the new ABC fall hit Commander in Chief. About 20 rooms of the White House are painstakingly reproduced on Sound Stages 11 and 12 at Raleigh Studios off Hollywood’s famous Melrose Avenue for the drama, created by Rod Lurie and taken over by Steven Bochco.

Another key difference in the reproduction, says production designer Eloise Stammerjohn: “Ours is more elegant than the real White House. It’s all about making the actors look good.”

Davis, who portrays the nation’s fictional first female president, Mackenzie Allen, is quite the role model. Davis amused the audience at the Golden Globe Awards last week by making up a story about a little girl tugging on her dress to tell her how the show inspired her to think of becoming president. But, Davis says, she has been getting positive reaction from the show’s fans.

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In a TIME special, Geena is mentioned as one of the 18 most influencal people of 2005. Photo by Art Streiber, larger version in the gallery.

Ginger Rogers, it is said, did everything Fred Astaire did – backward and in high heels. In a similar fashion, Davis, as the steely-spined first woman President on ABC’s Commander in Chief, once defused a crisis while dancing with the President of Russia. Does the drama’s success bode well for Hillary or Condi? They’d have big shoes to fill.