Actor Michael Keaton honored as Man of the Year by Harvard's Hasty Pudding theater group

BOSTON (AP) — Actor Michael Keaton jousted with an Oscar statue and made burgers Friday night as he was roasted before receiving the 2026 Man of the Year by Harvard University’s Hasty Pudding Theatricals.

The theater group, which dates to 1844 and claims to be the world’s third-oldest still operating, presented Keaton with his Pudding Pot award during the evening celebration. Afterward he attended a performance of Hasty Pudding’s 177th production, “Salooney Tunes.”

Hasty Pudding Theatricals gives out its Man and Woman of the Year awards to people who have made lasting and impressive contributions to the world of entertainment.

Keaton, an Academy Award-nominated and Emmy-winning actor, is known for roles in such films as “Batman,” “Birdman,” “Beetlejuice” and “Spotlight.” More recently he starred in and directed the short film “Sweetwater” and starred in and was executive producer on the eight-part Hulu miniseries “Dopesick.”

The ceremony opened with Keaton donning a Batman costume and chasing after an Oscar statue — a nod to the fact he never won one, though he was nominated in 2015 for “Birdman.” Keaton then jousted with the figure before stabbing it after the statue told him, “I thought your performance in ‘Birdman’ was subpar.”

He later was dressed up as a McDonald’s worker, a reference to his role playing Ray Kroc in a movie about the making of the fast food megachain. Armed with a spatula, he served a single customer who increasingly demanded bigger and bigger burgers while Keaton tried his best.

“You didn’t think I could do this. Make a huge burger for the guy,” Keaton said.

Keaton then received his Pudding Pot. After spending the day on campus, he praised Harvard students.

“I'm ridiculously encouraged about this country,” he said. “The older generation not so much. Man, these people I've met are extraordinarily impressive. It's been a ball. Based on these people, we are in good shape folks.”

Afterward he took questions from reporters and recalled his time working with Catherine O’Hara, the Canadian-born comic actor and “SCTV” alum who died last week. Keaton starred alongside O'Hara in “Beetlejuice” and “The Paper,” along with the small movie “Game 6,” in which she played the ex-wife of Keaton's character.

“I was just always a giant fan like everyone else,” Keaton said while recalling the early days of her career. “What was great about Catherine’s career to me was ... inside the comedy world, she was already kind of a goddess. ... She wasn’t really famous or anything, but we all knew how brilliant she was and how great she was and what a nice woman she was. And so then it started to take off for her.”

Keaton also recalled how much he came to admire Kroc in the making of the movie and made sure Kroc understood they would not “sugarcoat” or “soften” his portrayal.

Keaton added that for all Kroc's faults, “He was an unbelievably hard worker. That was the thing I hung on to, that determination.”

Actor Jon Hamm won the award last year. Other recent honorees have included Clint Eastwood, Tom Hanks, Robert De Niro, Harrison Ford, Samuel L. Jackson and Ryan Reynolds.

Hasty Pudding’s Woman of the Year, which dates to 1951, will be awarded Feb. 13 to Australian actor Rose Byrne.

Friday's event comes days after the Justice Department released a huge trove of records surrounding Jeffrey Epstein, a longtime donor to the organization. The documents provided new details about the amount of money Epstein had given to Hasty Pudding roughly between 2013 and 2019, regularly donating $50,000 each year to secure top-tier donor status and receiving perks of free tickets and other gifts in return, totaling more than $300,000.

The donations were made through the Jeffrey Epstein Virgin Islands Foundation and Gratitude for America, a charity affiliated with Epstein.

In an undated news release announcing Epstein's donations, Hasty Pudding officials described Epstein as a “well-known science and Harvard philanthropist” and said he “put his substantial support behind Harvard’s famous and oldest theatrical troupe.”

A spokesperson for Hasty Pudding directed questions to Andrew Farkas, chairman of the Hasty Pudding Institute of 1770, which includes the theatrical group. Hasty Pudding organizers did not address the Epstein donations during Keaton's news conference.

Actor Michael Keaton holds up his Pudding Pot that he received after being named 2026 Man of the Year from Harvard University's Hasty Pudding Theatricals at Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass., Friday, Feb. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Michael Casey)

Actor Michael Keaton arrives at Harvard University's Farkas Hall for the school's annual Hasty Pudding Theatricals Man of the Year award show, Friday, Feb. 6, 2026 in Cambridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Leah Willingham)

Actor Michael Keaton participates in a roast at Harvard University's annual Hasty Pudding Theatricals Man of the Year award show at Farkas Hall, Friday, Feb. 6, 2026 in Cambridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Leah Willingham)

Actor Michael Keaton arrives at Harvard University's Farkas Hall for the school's annual Hasty Pudding Theatricals Man of the Year award show, Friday, Feb. 6, 2026 in Cambridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Leah Willingham)

Actor Michael Keaton receives his award during Harvard University's annual Hasty Pudding Theatricals Man of the Year award show at Farkas Hall , Friday, Feb. 6, 2026 in Cambridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Leah Willingham)

Actor Michael Keaton participates in a roast at Harvard University's annual Hasty Pudding Theatricals Man of the Year award show at Farkas Hall, Friday, Feb. 6, 2026, in Cambridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Leah Willingham)

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Bombastic pro-Trump lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella pulled ahead in Colombia’s presidential race in the first round of elections over the weekend, capitalizing on a growing appetite for crackdowns on criminal groups across Latin America.

Second-place finisher, progressive Sen. Iván Cepeda, and his ally, President Gustavo Petro, have questioned the election results, without providing evidence.

Cepeda on Monday called on de la Espriella to debate him ahead of their June 21 runoff. De la Espriella replied on X: “Are you ready, coward? … First, acknowledge the election results and let’s debate right now.”

De la Espriella rapidly gained traction ahead of Sunday’s election and won nearly 44% of the vote. Cepeda, who had consistently led polling, won less than 41%.

In the runoff, De la Espriella is expected to scoop up additional votes from Colombians who supported other conservative candidates in the first round.

Cepeda will face an uphill battle, said Sergio Guzmán, a political analyst. De la Espriella's win is "a shift in public opinion that is very difficult to overcome. So now Abelardo is emerging as the likely favorite to win.”

Markets in Colombia and the Colombian peso jumped on Monday, likely a product of de la Espriella’s proposal to roll back regulations on businesses and willingness to open the country to fracking — a sharp turn from Petro’s environmental agenda.

The 47-year-old De la Espriella, known as “El Tigre” or “The Tiger,” has never held office in Colombia and prided himself on living a luxurious life in Italy before deciding to run for president.

He pitched himself as an outsider who would cozy up to U.S. President Donald Trump and follow El Salvador President Nayib Bukele's war on gangs, which has driven down homicide rates but fueled accusations of human rights abuses.

“I will wipe out narcoterrorism and those who I've declared a military target like cockroaches, like rats. I will unleash upon them the wrath of God never seen before,” de la Espriella said in an interview with The Associated Press in the final stretch of the campaign, where he promised to open 10 mega-prisons to fight crime.

He joins a growing number of leaders across Latin America, from Chile to Honduras, seeking to latch onto the “Bukele model” as voters across Latin America are ditching leaders who pitched progressive policies aimed at addressing the root issues of conflict such as lack of opportunities for young people and corruption.

De la Espriella's supporters come from a wide range of backgrounds. Yolanda Peréz, a 64-year-old woman serving coffee in Colombia's capital, Bogotá, said with a wink the day before the election: “I'm thinking of voting for El Tigre.”

Miguel Maheca, a 20-year-old first-time voter, flashed his ballot to his mother as he strolled out of the polling station on Sunday, saying with a grin, “Love isn't what's going to make us safe in Colombia."

But experts say El Salvador's security successes will be nearly impossible to replicate in a country like Colombia, which is more than 50 times larger than the Central American nation and has many more armed groups fighting for territory.

The Trump administration is playing a more aggressive role in Latin America than any U.S. government in decades, putting mounting pressure on countries like Colombia, Mexico and Ecuador to crack down on crime.

De la Espriella made a name for himself as a lawyer defending high-profile clients such as former President Álvaro Uribe as well as controversial figures like Alex Saab, a close ally of Venezuela’s ousted president Nicolás Maduro who faces legal issues in the U.S.

The progressive Cepeda has promised to carry on his ally Petro's fraught plan to achieve “total peace” by negotiating peace pacts with guerrillas and criminal gangs.

Their political movement was born from a rejection by many Colombians of a militarized offensive by Uribe in decades past to beat back guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. Thousands of civilians were killed by Colombian forces in a scandal known as “false positives.”

De la Espriella “represents a return to the paramilitary politics and drug-trafficking — a mafia-run, plutocratic and corrupt past that the country experienced during Álvaro Uribe’s two administrations,” Cepeda said on Sunday.

Petro, a former rebel, won Colombia's presidency in 2022, ending decades of domination by leaders from Uribe's political movement. He gained massive support from rural-dwelling, Indigenous and poorer Colombians who felt they had never been directly spoken to by the country's leaders.

Now that movement is backed into a corner.

“This is de la Espriella’s election to lose,” wrote Renata Segura, director of International Crisis Group's Latin America and the Caribbean Program. “Cepeda thought he could win appealing squarely to the left, and that proved to be a massive mistake. How he pivots in the next month will determine if he has any chance to win.”

Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

This version corrects the spelling of the first name of the leading candidate to Abelardo.

Soldiers guard during the presidential election in Santander de Quilichao, Colombia, Sunday, May 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Santiago Saldarriaga)

Supporters of presidential candidate Ivan Cepeda of the ruling Historic Pact coalition gather outside the polling station where he voted during the presidential election in Bogota, Colombia, Sunday, May 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

Presidential candidate Abelardo de la Espriella of the Defenders of the Motherland movement addresses supporters from inside a bulletproof booth after leading the first round of the presidential election and advancing to a runoff in Barranquilla, Colombia, Sunday, May 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)

Supporters of presidential candidate Ivan Cepeda of the ruling Historic Pact coalition react as presidential election results are announced in Bogota, Colombia, Sunday, May 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

Presidential candidate Ivan Cepeda of the ruling Historic Pact coalition addresses supporters after advancing to a runoff election in second place in Bogota, Colombia, Sunday, May 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix) CORRECTION: Corrects Paloma Valencia to Ivan Cepeda, and photographer Jose Vargas to Matias Delacroix

Presidential candidate Abelardo de la Espriella of the Defenders of the Motherland movement addresses supporters from inside a bulletproof booth after leading the first round of the presidential election and advancing to a runoff in Barranquilla, Colombia, Sunday, May 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Ivan Valencia)

Supporters of presidential candidate Abelardo de la Espriella of the Defenders of the Motherland movement celebrate election results in Barranquilla, Colombia, Sunday, May 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)

Presidential candidate Abelardo de la Espriella of the Defenders of the Motherland movement depart a polling station after voting during the presidential election in Barranquilla, Colombia, Sunday, May 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Ivan Valencia)