{"id":456749,"date":"2026-05-23T21:41:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T21:41:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/456749\/"},"modified":"2026-05-23T21:41:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T21:41:08","slug":"barbra-streisand-sends-video-message-to-cannes-film-festival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/456749\/","title":{"rendered":"Barbra Streisand Sends Video Message to Cannes Film Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tA knee injury may have kept Barbra Streisand<\/a> away from Cannes this year, but it wasn\u2019t enough to stop her sending a special video message for the festival\u2019s closing ceremony, where she was honored in absentia with the Palme d\u2019Or.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe statuette was brought on stage by Isabelle Huppert, who gave a speech that highlighted Streisand\u2019s achievements in film, music and on the stage and also her support for the LGBTQ+ community and religious and ethnic minorities. Then there followed a video reel that included clips from \u201cThe Way We Were,\u201d \u201cThe Mirror Has Two Faces,\u201d \u201cNuts,\u201d \u201cA Star is Born,\u201d \u201cUp the Sandbox\u201d and \u201cFunny Girl,\u201d before the icon herself appeared on the big screen in the Palais to a delighted audience. <\/p>\n

\n\tIn a lengthy message, Streisand revealed how she had fallen in love with foreign films thanks to a cinema near her high school that had shown black and white movies from the likes of Fran\u00e7ois Truffaut, Ingmar Bergman, Federico Fellini and Akira Kurosawa. \u201cI was mesmerized by those images on the screen,\u201d she said. \u201cThey were so powerful that they\u2019re still in my head. I wanted to be an actress and live in those other more interesting worlds.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tYears later as an actress, she said she realized she was always \u201clooking at the movie as a whole\u201d and was asking a lot of questions and making suggestions. \u201cI didn\u2019t realise at the time, but I was thinking like a director. Trying to figure out how to tell the story. And I had stories I wanted to tell.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAmong those stories was 1981\u2019s \u201cYentl,\u201d her directorial debut, for which Streisand became the first woman to win the Golden Globe for best director. But it was a film she said was very difficult to get off the ground. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI was a woman, which was an obstacle to people,\u201d she said. \u201cEven worse, was an actress who wanted to direct. So every studio turned me down. And for 15 years the project was on the verge of collapsing. But i had to make this movie.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBut she said that the \u201cpassion\u201d she had to make \u201cYentl\u201d was something shared among the filmmakers in the room in Cannes. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIn this crazy volatile world that seems more fractured every day, it\u2019s reassuring to see the compelling movies at this festival, by artists from many countries,\u201d she said. \u201cFilm has that magical ability to unite us, opening our hearts and mind. I\u2019m so proud to be part of this community, so merci beaucoup and vive la cinema!\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tStreisand had been due to attend Cannes to collect the honorary Palme in person, but midway through the festival announced that she\u2019d been told she shouldn\u2019t travel.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cOn the advice of my doctors, as I continue recovering from a knee injury, I am sadly unable to attend the Festival de Cannes this year,\u201d she said in a statement on Sunday. \u201cBut I am deeply honored to receive the honorary Palme d\u2019Or and had so been looking forward to celebrating the remarkable films of the 79th edition.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tShe added: \u201cI was also very much looking forward to spending time with colleagues whom I so admire \u2014 and, of course, returning to France, a place I have always loved. While I regret that I can\u2019t be there in person, I want to extend my warmest congratulations to all of the filmmakers from around the world whose extraordinary talent and creative vision are being celebrated this year. My heartfelt thanks to the Festival, and to everyone who continues to support and champion the art of cinema.\u201d<\/p>\n

Streisand is the third recipient of the honorary Palme d\u2019Or this year alongside legendary \u201cLord of the Rings\u201d filmmaker Peter Jackson on the opening night and John Travolta, who was surprised with award following the premiere of his directorial debut \u201cPropeller One-Way Night Coach.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThis is beyond the Oscar,\u201d Travolta said through tears. \u201cI can\u2019t believe this. This is the last thing I expected.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A knee injury may have kept Barbra Streisand away from Cannes this year, but it wasn\u2019t enough to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":456750,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[38946,6403,458,146,85,46],"class_list":["post-456749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-barbra-streisand","tag-cannes-film-festival","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-il","tag-israel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=456749"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456749\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/456750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=456749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=456749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=456749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}