Tina Fey Acceptance Speech | 2010 Mark Twain Prize

The Mark Twain Prize recognizes people who have had an impact on American society in ways similar to the distinguished 19th century novelist and essayist best known as Mark Twain. As a social commentator, satirist and creator of memorable characters, Samuel Clemens was a fearless observer of society, who startled and outraged many while delighting and informing many more with his uncompromising perspective of social injustice and personal folly. He revealed the great truth of humor when he said "against the assault of laughter nothing can stand."

The inaugural Mark Twain Prize was presented to Richard Pryor during the first annual Kennedy Center Celebration of American Humor, October 20, 1998. The event was created by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Bob Kaminsky, Peter Kaminsky, Mark Krantz, and John Schreiber and is televised annually. The Kennedy Center is grateful to Cappy McGarr for his steadfast support of the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor since its inception. Previous recipients of the Mark Twain include Richard Pryor (1998), Jonathan Winters (1999), Carl Reiner (2000), Whoopi Goldberg (2001), Bob Newhart (2002), Lily Tomlin (2003), Lorne Michaels (2004), Steve Martin (2005), Neil Simon (2006), Billy Crystal (2007), George Carlin (2008), Bill Cosby (2009, rescinded in 2018) Tina Fey (2010), Will Ferrell (2011), Ellen DeGeneres (2012), Carol Burnett (2013) Jay Leno (2014), Eddie Murphy (2015), Bill Murray (2016), David Letterman (2017), and Julia Louis-Dreyfus (2018).

#TwainPrize #PBSTwain

[FairsleyDifference]

She acknowledges on Letterman’s Netflix show that she felt undeserving at the time and she felt it was basically a political reward, but Lorne told her to take it while her parents were alive. It would make more sense if she got it now after finishing up 30 Rock and creating a dozen other shows and movies, along with her monster hit book and musical.

[noirjacques]

I’m still crying from Tina’s “….because I’m a stone cold
b!tch”. 😂🤣😂

[erinbailey]

Love seeing Tina Fey win earn this award — she’s a champion of women in comedy, always uplifting other people. She wrote beautiful things about her parents in her book.

[calomega]

Meanwhile, in 2022, her writing and acting for Mean Girls is #2 most watched on Netflix 18 years later. Tina was an icon before she knew it herself.

[radkej]

Tina Fey is such a great comedy writer/performer!

[eduardocuellar]

Responsible for Mean Girls, no one should forget

[adityamandhane]

Gonna add a comment actually congratulating this brilliant woman in the middle of all this bs. She is an icon. And has earned this by now. More than.

[cartoonraccoon]

Wow I just love her. So funny and so beautiful. I have been watching a lot of these lately, and she has been the most entertaining one.

[macbuff]

I used to live in the DC area and always loved visiting the Kennedy center. The rooftop is really beautiful

Tina Fey looks awesome here. Love the entire ensemble. Cool hairstyle, dress and heels. Very Westworld :)

[abdulsamadqureshi]

when she won that award she was at the peak. sarah palin impression, mean girls, 30 rocks and emmy awards, golden globes. At that time she was everywhere it was the perfect time for that award. before this she got best actress, best writer, best entertainer

[PatrickNeal]

Everyone talking about chappelle needs to realize that he was gone at this time. He was MIA and put his career on hold. Not quite the right time for an award nomination lol

[TK__]

"No matter what happens, we retain our sense of humor" Oh well.

[yvettejones]

She is so freakin funny. I wish she would have accepted this award as SarahPalin.

[julierogers]

Brilliant, classy, and F U N N Y!!!!

[ShyamkrishnanNair]

She's one of the greatest ever! 💯❤️

[cjhughes]

Lorne offered the Beatles a check to reunite on SNL and they almost did it. I think it was $4k. She's so fast, you can tell a lot of 30 Rock comes right out of her brain.

[bridgecross]

"Orange Alert" wow those were the days.

[zapfanzapfan]

"Orange Alert", well, that came 6 years later...

[MarcosIsABaritone]

Some gay hairstylist lied to her about that updo.

[twentyfifthdui]

That 100 years from now joke is so Mark Twain.