Spike Lee, Gena Rowlands, Debbie Reynolds to receive honorary Oscars.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Director Spike Lee and actresses Gena Rowlands and Debbie Reynolds will receive honorary Oscars for their filmmaking legacies, the organizers of the world's most coveted movie awards said Thursday.

Lee and Rowlands will receive the Honorary Award while Reynolds will be given the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award by the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences.

"We'll be celebrating their achievements with the knowledge that the work they have accomplished – with passion, dedication and a desire to make a positive difference – will also enrich future generations," Academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs said in a statement.

The recipients will be celebrated at the Academy's annual Governors Awards on Nov. 14.

Lee, 58, rose through the ranks of independent film to deliver work such as 1989's "Do The Right Thing" and 1992's biopic "Malcolm X," earning two Oscar nominations along the way, including a best documentary nod for 1997's "4 Little Girls."


Full story at Yahoo News.
(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy; Editing by Jill Serjeant and Bill Trott)