by Tabitha Kenlon
The third annual Audio Description Awards Gala was held on November 14. Created in 2021 to recognize achievement in audio description in entertainment and educational media, this year’s Awards Gala featured celebrity guests, film clips, and more than a dozen awards.
Hosts Marilee Talkington and Conchita Hernandez Legorreta welcomed guests from the arts, entertainment, and sports worlds to celebrate accessible films, series, books, and video games.
Awards were presented to:
- Jim Stovall – AD Visionary
- Netflix – AD Game Changer: Innovation
- Naughty Dog/Sony – AD Game Changer: Gaming
- Imagination Storybooks – AD Game Changer: Education
- Hallmark Media – AD Game Changer: Popular Entertainment
- Paramount – AD Game Changer: 100% Access
- Warner Bros. Discovery – Outstanding Achievement: Live Events
- Semillitas – Outstanding Achievement: Spanish Media (USA)
- BBC iPlayer – Outstanding Achievement: International Media
- “Wednesday” (Neflix/IDC) – People’s Choice Award (Series)
- “Everything Everywhere All at Once” (A24/Deluxe U.S.) – People’s Choice Award (Film)
Sponsors of the Awards Gala include: Amazon, Microsoft, Warner Bros. Discovery, Fox Corporation, Paramount, Spectrum, VITAC, and the National Association of Broadcasters. Supporters of the Audio Description Project include Sony Corporation of America and the Walt Disney Company.
The Awards Gala was broadcast with captions and audio description, and a simultaneous Spanish translation. The English AD was written by Joel Snyder (Audio Description Associates, LLC) and voiced by Ren Leach. The Spanish AD and Spanish dubbing was created by Dicapta’s team; the AD script writer was Andrea Gimenez, with narration by Oscar Javier Cuesta. Captions were provided by VITAC.
If you missed the original broadcast, you can still access it on multiple platforms:
- ACB Media
- ACB’s You Tube channel
- Peacock, courtesy NBCUniversal (subscription required; through December 31, 2023)
Visit ADAwardsGala.org for more information. You can also make a donation there to support ACB’s Audio Description Project and help us keep advocating for more and better audio description.