President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday this year's recipients for Kennedy Center honours, after overhauling the board of the Washington, D.C., performing arts venue at the start of his second term.

Actor Sylvester Stallone, Broadway star Michael Crawford, and musical artists Gloria Gaynor, George Strait and KISS will be feted in a ceremony to take place in December which Trump said he would host. 

The honorees from stage and screen have all enjoyed significant and award-winning careers, though in some cases are personally known to Trump. Trump said he was "98 per cent" involved in the selections; before this year, a bipartisan advisory committee historically picked recipients.

Trump was in a jocular mood for much of his freewheeling introductions at the Washington announcement, mixing politics — including praise for Republican senators John Thune and Lindsey Graham — and self-praise for his administration's legislation and accomplishments. It was a contrast to his depiction of the city as being "taken over by violent gangs and bloodthirsty criminals" and "drugged-out maniacs and homeless people," which have led to a controversial federal military intervention in the capital.

Trump a no-show in first term

President Dwight Eisenhower initiated the process of establishing the centre in the late 1950s, and in 1964, President Lyndon Johnson and Congress established that it would be named after the recently slain president John F. Kennedy.

Since the late 1970s, the main theatre has hosted an event in December honouring a wide range of performers, over 250 at this point, who have contributed to American culture. 

Trump did not attend any of those ceremonies during his first term.

Trump in the first weeks of his second presidency fired the centre's board of trustees and appointed himself the new chair. While it's not unusual for a president to name friends and allies to the Kennedy board, Trump essentially dispensed with a previous bipartisan composition of board members in a move that has been mirrored at arguably more important agencies and commissions.

The overhaul sparked a backlash among many artists, with some cancelling performances at the Kennedy Center's various venues, or resigning from its advisory boards. 

WATCH | Canadian artists on why they cancelled gigs at Kennedy Center: [embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_9X4jnj-AQ[/embed]

Concerns were expressed that Trump would politicize its signature event or render the process for selecting recipients unrecognizable. During his first term, he was accused of cheapening the Presidential Medal of Freedom ceremonies, with athletes — sometimes friends and acquaintances of Trump — seemingly over-represented.

The Center has generally ignored the political affiliations of its award recipients. Prominent liberals such as Barbra Streisand and Warren Beatty were honoured during the administration of Republican George W. Bush, and a leading conservative, Charlton Heston, was feted during the administration of Democrat Bill Clinton.

Trump on Wednesday said without offering evidence that the centre had been in "decline," and complained its about "woke programming."

WATCH l Trump targets the Kennedy Center: 

Trump wants ‘woke’ out of the Kennedy Center

U.S. President Donald Trump has put himself in charge of Washington’s Kennedy Center, vowing to get rid of ‘woke’ performances and prompting big names like Hamilton, Issa Rae and Louise Penny to cancel events in protest.

Phantom actor among honourees

Trump praised English actor Crawford during a visit to the Kennedy Center in March, according to reports, and lamented the closing of the Phantom of the Opera, the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical that Crawford, now 83, helped make famous. 

The Phantom premiered on London stages and made its Broadway debut in 1988. The show, which won received seven Tony awards and seven Drama Desk awards, had a record run on Broadway, finally closing in 2023 after nearly 14,000 performances.

"Even "Phantom of the Opera" is closing in the Biden Era!" Trump posted on social media at the time.

The tenor Crawford won the Tony Award for best actor in a leading role in the musical for The Phantom. Prior to that, he had some acclaim on stage and screen, with credits that included a 1967 film adaptation of the Stephen Sondheim musical A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum.

Trump is known to be a musical theatre enthusiast and early in his professional life was one of the investors in a 1970 Broadway comedy that closed after just under 100 performances. He has seen Phantom at least once, with Melania Trump posting on Facebook in 2012 an enthusiastic review of the show, saying the couple attended with the then-president of Georgia. 

All I Ask of You and and the musical's title track have been played at Trump campaign rallies. 

Gaynor's iconic disco anthem I Will Survive has also been played at Trump rallies. The song earned Gaynor a Grammy for best disco recording, and she won another Grammy 40 years later in 2019 for her gospel album, Testimony. 

Gaynor's disco hits also included covers of soul classics like Never Can Say Goodbye and Reach Out, I'll Be There.

Gaynor, 81, has also appeared onstage in musical theatre and was the subject of a 2024 documentary spanning her career and comeback as a gospel artist.

KISS announced an end to touring in 2023, 50 years after forming in New York City. The band struggled for a few years before 1975's Alive!, their fourth album breakthrough. Their commercial success was solidified the following year with the top 10 power ballad single Beth. 

The band had already acquired legions of fans, known as the KISS Army, for bombastic stage shows that included explosives, fire breathing and blood. The group are also considered trailblazers in band and tour merchandising. 

The original members of the band — Paul Stanley, Gene Simmons, Ace Frehley and Peter Criss — were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2014, with Rage Against the Machine guitarist hailing them at the time as "one of the most iconic and badass bands of all time."

Simmons in 2008 was one of the participants in the Trump-hosted Celebrity Apprentice reality competition.

Stallone, who lavished praise on Trump, honoured

The star of the blockbuster movie franchises Rocky and Rambo, the 79-year-old Stallone has been known to be friendly with the president, reportedly likening Trump to George Washington at a Mar-a-Lago event shortly after Trump's election win in November.

"We are in the presence of a really mythical character," Stallone reportedly said of Trump. 

Stallone earlier this year was appointed by Trump, along with fellow actors Mel Gibson and Jon Voight, as a "special ambassador" to Hollywood.

Stallone was a struggling actor when, partly inspired by journeyman boxer Chuck Wepner challenging Muhammad Ali, he penned the script for Rocky.

Trump on Wednesday offered a revisionist history of the film that won Best Picture at the Academy Awards in 1977. Trump claimed Stallone was reluctant to appear as Rocky Balboa and had to be convinced to do so; in fact, Stallone and others familiar with the production through the years have said he resisted efforts to see bigger established actors take on the role, which is what the film's producers originally desired.

Strait, 73, last year released his 31st studio album and first in five years, Cowboys and Dreamers. His recording career began in 1981, and within just a few short years, he had racked up a dozen No. 1 country hits. By 1998, he was already the all-time leading nominee in Country Music Awards history, and he sustained success after, being named artist of the first decade of the 2000's by the Academy of Country Music. 

The singer of country hits such as All My Ex's Live in Texas, Check Yes or No and Amarillo by Morning was inducted in the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2006. 

Strait still plays select dates, though he announced a retirement from widespread touring over a decade ago, with the Cowboy Rides Tour one of the most lucrative of 2014.