Julia Roberts brought the glamour to the Gotham Awards 2025.
Roberts, 58, attended the annual awards show with After the Hunt director Luca Guadagnino, which was held at Cipriani Wall Street in New York City, on Monday, October 1. The Oscar-winner stunned in a oversized blue satin suit for the event, which she paired with black stilettos, letting her wavy red hair cascade down her shoulders.
After walking the red carpet, Roberts and Guadagnino, 54, were honored with the Visionary Tribute award during the ceremony. The accolade was presented to the pair by Roberts’ friend Paul Rudd before she and Guadagnino took the stage to deliver a joint speech.
“I not only had a great privilege of acting with Luca, but I will be acting as his interpreter,” Roberts began before going into a running bit where she acted as Guadagnino’s “translator,” repeating his speech — which was in English — to the audience, but in Italian.
After sharing a laugh, Roberts joked that she wanted to make her speech quick because she needed to use the restroom.
“I didn’t realize how long this was gonna go on and I didn’t regulate my water intake,” she quipped. “Paul, thank you for those kind words. Everyone that is here living their creative dreams, thank you for doing that in a world that seems to be crumbling. This is the tape and the glue that keeps it together. One of my great dreams was to work with Luca Guadagnino, and now that I’ve done it once I just wanna keep on doing it.”
It was announced prior to Monday’s ceremony that Roberts and Guadagnino would receive the Gotham Awards Visionary Tribute for the film.
“The Gotham community has long cherished Luca Guadagnino’s emotionally expressive storytelling, and in After the Hunt, Julia Roberts delivers a luminous, monumental performance that deepens an already extraordinary career — guided by his singular direction behind one of the year’s most talked-about and provocative films,” said Jeffrey Sharp, Executive Director of The Gotham Film & Media Institute, in a statement. “Their partnership speaks to the power of collaboration at its highest level.”
Roberts, who portrayed Yale University professor Alma Imhoff in the psychological thriller, reflected on the honor, saying in a statement, “I could not have imagined collaborating on this project with anyone other than Luca Guadagnino.”
She continued, “To inhabit a character like Alma. So unrelenting, so burdened with secrets and unresolved trauma one must be in complete concert with the director. With Luca it was a continuous and unfolding joy. He understands human behavior in a unique and fascinating way and his attention to detail is unsurpassed. There is nothing that would make me happier than to broaden my life as an actor in continued collaboration with him.”
After the Hunt chronicles the internal conflict Alma faces when she “finds herself at a personal and professional crossroads when a star pupil levels an accusation against one of her colleagues and a dark secret from her own past threatens to come to light,” per the official logline.
For Guadagnino, 54, casting Roberts in the film was a no-brainer.
“I only cast the actors and actresses I fall in love with – a palpable emotion for them, anticipation and enthusiasm when I see them – my emotional confidence in them blends into chemistry. And now I love Julia Roberts,” he said in a statement prior to the ceremony. “She is everything. Julia Roberts is Cinema with a capital C.”
The director also praised Roberts for her role of Shelby Eatenton-Latcherie in 1989’s Steel Magnolias, which marked the first time he saw her on the big screen
“Even early in her career trusting her audience and inviting them into her story as Shelby,” he said. “Her light has never dimmed, only grown brighter and after over four decades, dare I say more refined. I knew I would someday need to work with her.”
In addition to the special Visionary Tribute, it was previously announced that Jeremy Allen White and Scott Cooper would receive The Gotham Cultural Icon Tribute for Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere, Kate Hudson and Hugh Jackman would be honored with The Gotham Musical Tribute for Song Sung Blue, Noah Baumbach would accept the Director Tribute for Jay Kelly, Tessa Thompson would receive the Spotlight Tribute for Hedda, the Sinners cast would be celebrated with the Ensemble Tribute and Frankenstein would receive The Gotham Vanguard Tribute.
