Jimmy Kimmel’s post Academy Awards bash has been a tradition of awards season for the past nine years with previous guests for the hour long special including Ben Affleck and Tom Cruise. This year, the host has scored a lineup that includes nominees and some of his favourite guests. Best Actress nominee Meryl Streep will join Best Director favourite Martin Scorsese along with Captain Phillip’s newcomer Barkhad Abdi and this year’s Oscars host Ellen DeGeneres. Also dropping by will be Kevin Spacey who will serve as the lead guest while big names like Tom Hanks and Morgan Freeman will also make an appearance. Fans of the Hemsworth brothers are in for a treat as both Chris and Liam are scheduled to appear along with Christoph Waltz, Ben Kingsley, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Seth Rogen, Andy Garcia, Adam Driver, Queen Latifah, Gary Oldman and Anjelica Huston. Kimmel’s A-list guest list is largely helped by the fact he shoots his show across the street from the Dolby Theatre where this year’s Oscars will take place on Sunday night. The show will air live on ABC after the 86th Academy Awards and will also include a popular comedy video segment following the success of last year when Kimmel premiered the trailer for the star-filled Movie: The Movie. Many thanks to everybody for the heads-up.

The Eugene O’Neill Theater Center announced that tickets are publicly available for the 14th Annual Monte Cristo Award, honoring Meryl Streep. The award, presented to Ms. Streep at a Gala event in her honor, will be held at the Edison Ballroom, New York City, on Monday, April 21. Individual tickets start at $750, and can be purchased at www.theoneill.org. The Monte Cristo Award celebrates and honors a theater artist who exemplifies the great American dramatist Eugene O’Neill’s pioneering spirit and unceasing artistic commitment to excellence. The 14th Annual Monte Cristo Award will be presented by close friend, colleague, and fellow O’Neill alumnus Joe Grifasi. Meryl Streep’s great empathy for her characters and the diversity of women she has chosen to portray have distinguished her work in film, television, and theater for nearly three decades. A graduate of Vassar College and Yale School of Drama, one of Ms. Streep’s first professional jobs after Yale was with the O’Neill’s National Playwrights Conference in 1975, acting in five plays over six weeks. More information on ticket purchases can be found here.

Indiana University has announced actress Meryl Streep will receive an honorary doctoral degree during an April visit to the Bloomington campus. Streep will receive the degree during a ceremony in the beginning of her Jorgensen Guest Filmmaker Lecture at 3 p.m. April 16 at IU Auditorium. In 2010, Streep served as a keynote speaker for the Colloquium for Women of Indiana University’s fall workshop, part of the IU Women’s Philanthropy Initiative.

Indiana University is delighted to recognize Meryl Streep, one of our nation’s greatest living actors, for her extraordinary talents, her highly visible place in the arts and her role as a powerful advocate for women, as well as for her longstanding connection to our institution,” IU President Michael A. McRobbie said. “Through conferral of this honorary doctoral degree, we not only welcome her to the IU family but pay tribute to her remarkable contributions to cinema and to the fabric of American culture while also recognizing our own rich academic traditions in film and theater.

Streep will receive her honorary degree during a ceremony in the beginning of her Jorgensen Guest Filmmaker Lecture at 3 p.m. April 16 at IU Auditorium. The interview-format lecture will be led by Barbara Klinger, a professor in the College of Arts and Sciences’ Department of Communication and Culture. The lecture is free and open to the public, but tickets are required. Tickets are available beginning March 3 at the IU Auditorium box office, open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. There is a limit of four tickets per person for the lecture. Thanks to everybody for the heads-up.

According to ScreenDaily, Meryl Streep is set to play iconic political activist Emmeline Pankhurst in Ruby Films drama “Suffragette”, which begins shooting in the UK on Monday (Feb 24). The Oscar-winning actress is in final negotiations to join the project, which will reunite the star with The Iron Lady writer Abi Morgan and financier Pathe. ScreenDaily understands that Streep will have a small but important role in the film, which will see her character give a “tour de force” speech on women’s rights during a political rally. Additional high profile casting has rounded on the project in recent weeks and will be announced in the coming days. Pathe, Film4 and the BFI are among backers on the drama, in which Carey Mulligan stars as Maude, a “foot soldier of the early feminist movement” who becomes radicalized and turns to violence as a route to change. Sarah Gavron (Brick Lane) directs “Suffragette”, producers are Ruby’s Faye Ward and Alison Owen. Executive producers are Pathe’s Cameron McCracken and Film4’s Tessa Ross and Katherine Butler, while Chris Collins is lead exec for the BFI Film Fund.

Oscar-winning actor Philip Seymour Hoffman has died on Sunday. He was 46. Hoffman, who won the best actor Oscar for “Capote” in 2005, most recently appeared at the Sundance Film Festival to promote his new films “God’s Pocket” and Anton Corbin’s “A Most Wanted Man.” Hoffman and Meryl Streep have frequently worked together on the stage and on film. In 2001, he played her son in Mike Nichols’ Shakespeare in the Park production of “The Seagull”. In 2005, they participated in the Coen Brothers’ stage production “Theater of the New Ear”. And in 2008, both Hoffman and Streep received Oscar nominations for their work in “Doubt”. Upon accepting her Screen Actors Guild Award in 2008, Meryl Streep thanked her co-star. “Thank you to Philip Seymour Hoffman, who is just the most fun to work with and the most.. he’s just such a great example to all of us of how to live your work with integrity and imagination, every time, every time out!”

News by the Boston Globe. Meryl Streep plans to establish two scholarship funds for students at the University of Massachusetts Lowell, UMass Lowell said Wednesday. The scholarships will be endowed with all net proceeds from her Streep’s scheduled appearance Feb. 5 at the Tsongas Center at UMass Lowell. Streep is expected to discuss her acting career during the event. The new Meryl Streep Endowed Scholarship Fund will assist outstanding UMass Lowell English majors with the cost of their education, the university said. The Joan Hertzberg Endowed Scholarship, also to be established by Streep, will support students who excel in math as Hertzberg did. Hertzberg was a former classmate of Streep’s at Vassar College. Hertzberg transferred to Williams College, where she was the valedictorian of the college’s first graduating class that included women. She had a successful career as a therapist, author and teacher in the San Francisco area before her death in 2013, the university’s press release said. A Feb. 5 event at the university is set to feature Streep and Andre Dubus III, a UMass Lowell faculty member and author. The event is titled “A Conversation with Meryl Streep.” At the event, Steep is expected to discuss her acting career. Tickets can may be purchased through the Tsongas Center box office, whose website is www.tsongascenter.com. Streep’s appearance is expected to raise in more than $100,000 for her two scholarship funds, the university said.

The 25th Palm Springs International Film Festival is honoring three-time Oscar-winning actress Meryl Streep with its Icon Award. The actress, who won her Academy Awards for 1989’s “Kramer Vs. Kramer,” 1982’s “Sophie’s Choice” and 2011’s “The Iron Lady,” will receive the festival’s honor at its awards gala Jan. 4 at the Palm Springs Convention Center. Streep has already received lead actress nominations for the Screen Actors Guild Awards, the Golden Globes and Critics’ Choice Movie Awards for her performance as matriarch of a dysfunctional family in “August: Osage County,” which opens Dec. 27. “We’re overjoyed to recognize Meryl Streep for yet another Oscar-worthy performance in ‘August: Osage County,” festival chairman Harold Matzner said in a statement. Streep joins previously announced Palm Springs honorees Sandra Bullock, Bruce Dern, Tom Hanks, Matthew McConaughey, Steve McQueen, Thomas Newman, Lupita Nyong’o, Julia Roberts and the cast of “American Hustle.” Additionally, Meryl has been named Best Actress by the Nevada Film Critics Society for “August: Osage County”. Many thanks to Frank and Snafu for the heads-up.

The Giffoni Film Fest will honor award-winning actress Meryl Streep at its 44th festival, according to the Hollywood Reporter. The festival will be held July 18-27, 2014. Based in the village of Giffoni Valle Piana, it is Europe’s oldest and largest event focused on young movie and music lovers. The festival’s lineup is typically unveiled in June, but artistic director Claudio Gubitosi released a few of the anticipated highlights in advance. Streep, who previously attended the festival in 2001, will be honored with the Giffoni Fellowship Award. The 2014 festival, which will use the theme “Be Different” and will celebrate the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the 125th anniversary of the birth of Charlie Chaplin; it will also feature a marathon of Marvel-related productions, including a special night of superheroes.

And here are a couple more nominations from various critics awards. First and most recent, she has received a Best Actress nomination by the Critics Choice Awards – alongside Cate Blanchett for Blue Jasmine, Sandra Bullock for Gravity, Judi Dench for Philomena, Brie Larson for Short Term 12 and Emma Thompson for Saving Mr. Banks. Then, Meryl has been nominated by the Chicago Film Critics Association, alongside Blanchett, Bullock, Adele Exarchopoulos for Blue is the Warmest Color and Larson. They will announce the winner tonight. The Houston Film Critics have nominated her alongside Bullock, Dench, Larson and Thompson – this has been won already by Bullock. And the San Fransisco Film Critics have nominated Meryl alonside Blanchett, Bullock, Dench, Exarchopoulos and Larson. Their awards will be announced later.

Meryl Streep has received a Golden Globe nomination as Best Actress in a Comedy or Musical for “August: Osage County”. The competition differs to the SAG Awards (since they don’t split categories into Drama or Comedy). Nominated alongside Meryl are Amy Adams (American Hustle), Julie Delpy (Before Midnight), Greta Gerwig (Frances Ha) and Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Enough Said). Julia Roberts has received a nomination as Best Supporting Actress. This is Meryl Streep’s 28th nomination for a Golden Globe and the ninth in the comedy category. The 71st Golden Globe Awards, hosted by Tina Fey and Amy Poehler, will be held on Sunday, Jan. 12 in Beverly Hills.