The Kennedy Center has officially embraced its first post-“woke” class of honorees. Over the summer, Donald Trump announced that the institution will honor KISS, Sylvester Stallone, George Strait, Gloria Gaynor, and Phantom Of The Opera star Michael Crawford, explaining: “We ended the woke political programming, and we’re restoring the Kennedy Center as the premier venue for performing arts anywhere in the country, anywhere in the world… Maybe next year, we’ll honor Trump, OK?” The president and Kennedy Center chairman has also said that he begrudgingly agreed to host tonight’s ceremony after being allegedly begged to do so.
Today Trump bestowed the Tiffany & Co.-redesigned metals to the honorees at the Oval Office. KISS’ Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley, and Peter Criss were all present to accept the medal; original guitarist Ace Frehley’s daughter accepted the medal on her father’s behalf, as he died in October. See clips of the medal ceremony ahead of tonight’s official ceremony below.
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Frehley suffered multiple skull fractures and a brain bleed after he fell at his home studio in late September. He was placed on a ventilator before his family removed him from life support a couple of weeks later. An autopsy determined that Frehley’s cause of death was accidental blunt force trauma. But his bandmate Simmons speculates that Frehley’s relationship with alcohol also contributed to his death, according to an interview with the New York Post published Saturday. Simmons said:
[Frehley] refused [advice] from people that cared about him – including yours truly – to try to change his lifestyle. In and out of bad decisions. Falling down the stairs — I’m not a doctor — doesn’t kill you. There may have been other issues, and it breaks my heart… The saddest thing – you reap what you shall sow unfortunately.
Frehley left KISS in 1982, so his death didn’t impede on November’s KISS Kruise: Landlocked In Vegas event, the band’s first gigs since their 2023 farewell tour ended.
