The stars and surrounding paparazzi flashes lit up this year’s Stella by Starlight gala and awards ceremony at The Pierre, benefiting the Stella Adler Studio of Acting. Guests were welcomed by Stella’s daughter Ellen Adler (Studio vice chair) and Ellen’s son Tom Oppenheimer (Studio president and artistic director). Co-chairs included: Michael Medavoy, Roy Scheider, Lauren Bacall, Julie Harris, Sidney Lumet, and Whoopi Goldberg.

Guests enjoyed “A Salute to Musical Theater,” conceived by Scheider and director Gordon Hunt, which featured such headliners as: Ann Reinking, Audra McDonald, and Patti LuPone.

The Stella Adler School of Acting Awards included Mike Nichols’ presentation of the Jacob Adler Award (named for Stella’s late father), for courageous contributions to Jewish-American culture, to award-winning playwright Tony Kushner. The Group Theater Award, for prolific achievement in theater, film, and television arts, was given to 89-year-old playwright Arthur Miller, then ill, who recently passed away; his daughter (with the late photographer Inge Morath) screenwriter Rebecca Miller Lewis (wife of actor Daniel Day-Lewis), accepted the award on his behalf.

The Stella Adler Award for consummate artistic achievement was presented to the late, great Marlon Brando by renowned director Arthur Penn (brother of photog Irving Penn). It was accepted by Hollywood Prince and Golden Boy Warren Beatty, who recently assumed the venerable position of honorary chairman of the acting school, which Brando held until his death this past July at the age of 80.

Beatty, handsome as ever at 67, gave the latest issue of The Sheet, featuring cover-girl beauty Annette Bening (his wife of 12 years, home in L.A. with their four kids), an enthusiastic thumbs up! Not often seen about town, he was quite approachable and told us that he was actually enjoying the paparazzis’ flashes!

Other Brando pals and admirers included: Jessica Lange, Ron Howard (with actress daughter Bryce Dallas Howard), Mikhail Baryshnikov, Tony Danza, Eli Wallach and Anne Jackson, Marian Seldes, Barbara Hearst, Katharina Otto-Bernstein, Bebe Buell, and Miko Brando (Marlon’s son). New stars may be brilliant, but the more seasoned stars glow with an incomparable luster...