February 8, 2012

Precious Awarded PGA's Stanley Kramer Award

by Natalie Sullivan | Published December 2, 2009

Mo'Nique stars in Precious (2009).

The Producers Guild of America (PGA) announced it will award the 2010 Stanley Kramer Award to the producers of Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire. The award, established in 2002, honors the legacy of the late director Stanley Kramer and is presented to a film, television program, studio, network, producer, executive or individual whose work explores and addresses provocative social issues. PGA Award co-chairs David Friendly and Laurence Mark offer insight into their decision: ”Precious is a remarkable film that sends a powerful message of hope—brilliantly reminding us that we have the power to persevere regardless of life’s difficulties.”

The Stanley Kramer Award is only the latest accolade for the film. Precious opened at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival, where it went on to win the Audience Award, Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic and the Special Jury Prize. Since then, the film has won the People’s Choice Award at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival. The film, set in Harlem in 1987, follows 16 year-old Precious as she navigates her way through unwanted pregnancy, abuse and illiteracy, and her journey to find the self-determination and will needed to change her situation.

In response to this year’s recipient, Karen Kramer, Stanley’s wife, says that “Stanley’s films always talked about things we wanted to ignore. He taught us so much about ourselves and made us think about our values and purpose. Precious is truly a film that embraces this philosophy.”

The award will be presented to the producers at the 21st annual PGA Awards ceremony on January 24, 2010 at the Palladia in Hollywood. Previous recipients of the award include Milk, An Inconvenient Truth, The Great Debaters and Hotel Rwanda.

For more information, visit http://www.producersguild.org/pg/awards_a.