Morgan Freeman earns DeMille Award at Globes

LOS ANGELES (AP) ― Academy Award winner Morgan Freeman is taking home a new prize ― a lifetime-achievement honor at the Golden Globes.

The Hollywood Foreign Press Association announced Wednesday that Freeman will receive the group’s Cecil B. DeMille Award at the 69th annual Globes ceremony on Jan. 15.

The 74-year-old Freeman is a five-time Oscar nominee who won the supporting-actor prize for 2004’s “Million Dollar Baby.” Freeman’s Oscar nominations include best actor for 1989’s “Driving Miss Daisy,” for which he won a Golden Globe.

Freeman made his big-screen debut as an extra in 1965’s “The Pawnbroker,” and his film work remained modest over the next two decades.

His big successes early on came in theater, which brought him a Tony Award nomination for 1978’s “The Mighty Gents,” and television, where he was a regular for six years on the children’s show “The Electric Company.”

Freeman’s big-screen career took off with 1987’s crime drama “Street Smart,” which earned him his first Oscar nomination. Among his credits since then are “Glory,” “Unforgiven,” “The Shawshank Redemption,” “Bruce Almighty” and its sequel, this year’s family hit “Dolphin Tale,” and the current “Batman” franchise, including next summer’s “The Dark Knight Rises.”

DeMille Award winners are chosen by the board of directors for the foreign press group, which includes about 90 reporters who cover Hollywood for overseas outlets.

The DeMille Award went to Robert De Niro a year ago. Other past winners include Steven Spielberg, Barbra Streisand, Shirley MacLaine, Jack Nicholson and Clint Eastwood, who directed Freeman in “Million Dollar Baby.”

Hollywood’s second-biggest movie awards after the Oscars, the Golden Globes will air live on NBC.