Star Trek and Reading Rainbow star LeVar Burton to be honored with Lifetime Achievement Emmy Award

LeVar Burton appears as Grand Marshal of the Rose Parade 2022

APRIL 27, 2022 - Star Trek veteran LeVar Burton will be honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 1st Annual Children’s & Family Emmy Awards, to be held in December of this year. Variety reported the announcement from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Tuesday morning.

Burton has been a champion of literature for decades. From his long run as host and executive producer of Reading Rainbow to his hit podcast LeVar Burton Reads and everything in between, Burton has advocated for inclusion, education, and acceptance. On top of being an accomplished author and actor, Burton has won a Peabody Award, a Grammy, three NAACP Awards, and 13 Emmy Awards throughout his career.

The new Children’s and Family Emmy Awards will be the first addition to the Emmy Awards show lineup since 1979. NATAS president and CEO Adam Sharp welcomed the new ceremony in a statement, saying, “We look forward to honoring this year’s unparalleled class of Lifetime Achievement honorees — each an icon in their craft — and couldn’t be more excited to award the first-ever Children’s & Family Emmys [...] After two years of virtual ceremonies, we’re overjoyed to once again be together, in-person, to celebrate the best of television.”

Other 2022 honorees of the NATAS Lifetime Achievement Award include the legendary historian and documentarian Sir David Attenborough (Documentary Television), Days Of Our Lives actor John Aniston (Daytime Television), journalist Judy Woodruff (News Television), and the long-running PBS series This Old House. This Old House will join an elite group of only two other shows to receive the honor, alongside Sesame Street and 60 Minutes. Technology entrepreneur Yvette Kanouff (Television Technology & Engineering) and journalist Lesley Visser (Sports Television) will also be honored this year.

Burton will be honored December 11th at the 1st Annual Children’s and Family Television Emmy Awards. The ceremony will be held at the Wilshire Ebell Theater in Los Angeles.