On stage: Presenters and award winners

Mark Ronson presenting to Sam Sparro

...after Cheyenne Jackson accepts, joking, "And I didn't even have to kiss a girl!"

Michelle Williams introducing Labelle

Adele is barely able to reach the mic, but is so adorable as she presents to Kay Perry...

Dan & Dean Caten accept for Stylemakers of the Year

John Cameron Mitchell presents to Gus Van Sant

The men of Milk, including screenwriter Dustin Lance Black (right) accept on Van Sant's behalf.

Photos by Rae Votta

Artist of the Year: Gus Van Sant

Gus Van Sant is Out's Artist of the Year:

Coming after several years of smaller, independent films from the director (2003's Cannes Palme d'Or winner Elephant, 2007's Paranoid Park), Gus Van Sant's latest mainstream movie foray, Milk, is arguably his most ambitious undertaking to date. The robust cast of young actors is rivaled in number only by Spartacus and 300, yet with his deft hand he manages to make ample use of every actor who comes into the frame, most notably Sean Penn, James Franco, Diego Luna, and Emile Hirsch. Though Van Sant has always favored realistic and compelling storytelling over creating positive gay role models for their own sake, in Milk his admiration for the San Francisco politician is clear.

The road to Milk was hardly an easy one, with everyone and their boyfriend racing to get rights to various versions of the story onto the screen. After Van Sant read Dustin Lance Black's tremendous script and signed on to direct the film, Academy Award–winning producers Dan Jinks and Bruce Cohen quickly came on board, and in a matter of months, the Portland, Ore.–based Van Sant was on his way to San Francisco to create the long-awaited epic. Both Penn and Franco cite Van Sant's involvement as the major force behind their interest in heading the cast. The auteur—whose genre-defying films include Drugstore Cowboy, My Own Private Idaho, the Oscar-nominated Good Will Hunting, Finding Forrester, and Last Days—will undoubtedly have a very busy awards season next spring as Academy voters consider Milk.

Photo: Greg Lotus

Entertainer of the Year: Cheyenne Jackson

Cheyenne Jackson is Out's Entertainer of the Year:

Is Cheyenne Jackson the man we've all been waiting for? Handsome and talented, able to seduce audiences of all genders and ages, he's the elusive figure with the potential to demolish the theory that an out actor can't get plum roles. Most recently he starred in Broadway's hilarious surprise hit Xanadu, which closed in September after 513 performfances ("That's 512 more than anyone thought we'd do," he says). Jackson is definitely not a privately tortured leading man like Rock Hudson—who, incidentally, Jackson says he would like to portray: "Tony Roberts, who I worked with the last 15 months in Xanadu, knew Rock Hudson and said that I reminded him of Rock, and that resonated with me.

I think it would be a good marriage of subject and actor." Neither is Jackson the openly disaffected would-be leading man, like Rupert Everett. "The only way I know how to be is me," he says of his singular potential as an actor. With an album in the works, an upcoming TV tryst with one very lucky Lindsay Price on Lipstick Jungle, and hidden talents yet to be revealed, we should all be paying very close attention.

Photo: Greg Lotus

Musician of the Year: Katy Perry

Katy Perry is Out's Musician of the Year:

"You think maybe you might have success in the States and be a hometown hero," says Katy Perry on the eve of her return home to Los Angeles after touring relentlessly to promote her new album, One of the Boys. "But you never realize the whole world would actually sing along, you know?" Despite the record's international leap up the charts, the whole world didn't sing along to its two queerest tracks: "Ur So Gay," a tongue-in-cheek send-off to Perry's ex-boyfriend, and the bi-curious number 1 summer smash "I Kissed a Girl."

The Santa Barbara, Calif.–born daughter of two pastors took a lashing from both Christian conservatives who claimed she was an abomination and gay activists who castigated her for reinforcing stereotypes and trivializing lesbianism. Yet even after a year of fielding tough questions about the divisive singles, Perry maintains she is simply espousing self-exploration and open-mindedness. "I think certain parts of the world—especially in the U.S.—are just dying to be offended," she says. "I get a lot of journalists in Europe who are like, ‘What's the big deal? People are OK with hip-hop videos, where there are strippers and drugs and gangs and guns, when you're singing about an innocent kiss?' I'm aware of people's opinions, but it won't change how I express myself as an artist."

Photo: Greg Lotus

Stylemakers of the Year: Dean & Dan Caten

Dean & Dan Caten are Out's Stylemakers of the Year:

Identical twins Dean and Dan Caten, founders and designers of Dsquared2, are best known for their low-lower-lowest–cut jeans and their explosive runway spectacles. The Toronto-born brothers, touted for bringing the party back to men's fashion, launched their men's collection from Milan in 1994, and nearly a decade later introduced women's wear and men's underwear lines. Their much buzzed-about spring 2009 runway show in Milan featured sleek suits and sportswear with preppy silhouettes and Run-DMC–era hip-hop flourishes on a nearly all nonwhite cast, while a runway show in 2003 included Christina Aguilera stripping the clothes off male models. When asked by the BBC to define their clothing lines, both said, almost in unison (which happens not infrequently), "It's hot and chic sportswear—but it's us." In 2008 their Hong Kong flagship store opened, joining their brand boutiques in Milan, Capri, Kiev, and Istanbul.

Photo: Roger Erickson

Newsmaker of the Year: Bishop Gene Robinson

Bishop Gene Robinson is Out's Newsmaker of the Year:

"During this last five years, God has seemed palpably close. That is the only thing that has enabled me to endure," says Episcopal bishop Gene Robinson, the first out, non-celibate priest to be ordained a bishop in a major Christian denomination. And there has been plenty to endure, including death threats (he wore bulletproofing under his vestments at his ordination ceremony) and angry and virulent calls for his resignation from conservative bishops from around the world.

Though Robinson's rural diocese of New Hampshire is small, the issues surrounding his election and ordination are global. "Given that the ‘issue' facing all religious institutions at this time is homosexuality, my election and consecration has crystallized that issue in a concrete way, not just for the Episcopal Church, but for the entire church worldwide," says Robinson. In 2008, the year of a pair of personal triumphs—he was joined in a civil union to Mark Andrew, his partner of 20 years, and he published his memoir, In the Eye of the Storm, with a foreword by Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu—Robinson met another affront in the denial of his admission to the Lambeth Conference, the once-a-decade meeting of the world's Anglican leaders, by the archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams.

Photo: Roger Erickson

On stage: Sam Sparro accepts

Breakthrough artust of the year Sam Sparro accepted his award briefly by thanking Out for portraying the LGBT community in a tasteful and truthful manner. Performance by the legendary Patti Labelle up next!

-- JH

Now on stage: Chelsea Handler and Aaron Hicklin

Chelsea Lately's Chelsea Handler and Out Editor in Chief Aaron Hicklin open the show

Breakout Star of the Year: Sam Sparro

Sam Sparro is Out's Breakout Star of the Year:

Perhaps Chaka Khan summed it up best: "That white boy can sing." The compliment came when the R&B titan heard a 12-year-old Sam Sparro belting out a gospel hymn at a church performance in east Los Angeles. Thirteen years later, Sparro is responsible for one of 2008's most exhilarating dance tracks, the pensive electro-funk charger "Black and Gold," which scored the rising gay soul star a top-five single in the U.K. and his birthplace of Australia. Sparro admits he was unprepared for the runaway success of his self-titled debut and the new celebrity praise that followed. "The biggest surprise for is me is how people I've admired are now aware of my music," he says. "When I met Pharrell Williams at a TV show we were filming in London and he told me how much he digs what I'm doing, I thought, Wow, I've made it."

Brandishing a wicked sense of humor (yes, "Cottonmouth" is about smoking weed), a voice that has earned him comparisons to Cee-Lo and Prince as well as a wardrobe full of gold leggings, African prints, and leather trousers, Sparro was this year's refreshingly flamboyant pop hero. Next year the songsmith, who has been touring exhaustively overseas, will head home to L.A. to craft what he calls his masterpiece. "I'm going to really take my time on my next album and be bold and experimental," Sparro says. "I really want to spread out and spend more time in the States."

Photo: Greg Lotus

Now on stage: Cheyenne Jackson

"And I didn't even have to kiss a girl," noted Xanadu hunk Cheyenne Jackson. Jackson humbly accepted his award by saying, "If I can make a difference just by being myself openly, then I totally accept that." He threw a shout out to Obama's victory -- "Change is possible!" -- To rousing applause.

-- JH