Nobility rubbed elbows with New York A-listers at Cipriani 42nd Street for the annual Princess Grace Awards gala, benefiting the foundation named for the late Grace Kelly, a member of Hollywood royalty before she wed the late Prince Rainier III of Monaco in 1956. (That same year, her film The Swan was released, in which she played a princess about to wed a prince, opposite Alec Guinness.)

The Princess Grace Foundation-U.S.A. was created by Prince Rainier (who died after a long illness in April, at 81), in memory of his wife, after her death following a car crash in 1982 at the age of 52. The Princess had long supported young artists aspiring to a performing arts career, and believed that the training of emerging talent in the U.S. was essential to continued artistic excellence.

Gala host Sharon Stone set the evening’s tone for glamour and style. Prince Albert of Monaco (son of Princess Grace and Prince Rainier) emceed the bash alongside Alberto Repossi of the principality’s Repossi Joailliers. Sorely missed that evening was Prince Rainier (then hospital-bound with the respiratory infection which he would succumb to a little more than five months later).

The Foundation awarded $350,000 in grants to up-and-coming artists in the fields of dance, film, and theatre, followed by Tony Kushner’s presentation of a special career achievement award to theatre director George C. Wolfe. Among the star-studded crowd: Queer Eye guys Carson Kressley, Thom Filicia, Jai Rodriguez, and Kyan Douglas; Al Reynolds and Star Jones Reynolds; Anne Hathaway; Denise Rich; Dionne Warwick; Dr. Ruth Westheimer; Mary Alice Stephenson; Meredith Vieira; Lynn Wyatt; Molly Ringwald; Pierre Cardin; Richard Belzer; Tonya Pinkins; Kimberly Guilfoyle; Yves Piaget; Sol Kerzner; and Carol Alt.

The Princess’s patronage lives on, through the talent and joie de vivre of these future artists....